Coincidence and Bad Judgment
by Vanya-Deyja
Summary: Request for Jameis. Van/Raven CC. Van is injured during a battle and Raven, begrudgingly, helps him. As always things get complicated from there on out.
1. Chapter 1

**Coincidence and Bad Judgment **

Hey everybody, another smattering of mini-fic from me, this time a request by _Jameis_. While I do like Van/Raven this isn't the exact sort of thing I'd normally write so it was something of an interesting little challenge. Hopefully somebody enjoys it! (Hopefully Jameis on that note!).

This will only be a few chapters short, hopefully completed in a few months, rated M so I can go where ever I need to but that rating is subject to change. Jameis request is abridged below as the summary. Some details have been lifted to fend off too many spoilers.

_Jameis Request:_

_Van/Raven Zoids CC  
><em>_Van is weakened during an ambush by wild Zoids shortly after his first fight with Raven. Already damaged the Shield Liger and Van sustain massive injuries. Raven finds them dying and is horrified at Van's condition. He resolves to nurse Van back to health._

WARNINGS:  
>1. Eventual YAOI. If you'd rather jump ship now be my guest. No guarantees on the level of smut this may involve. I'll have a talk with my requester on that and keep you updated. Nothing overtly sexual is included in this chapter.<br>2. SWEARING. I'm very good at that so expect fairly consistent profanity.  
>3. Mundane mentions of GORE but more detailed trespassing there later.<br>4. Inklings of DARK THEMES in the sense that, while I hope to keep this on a balance between black humor and general sweetness, there are mentions to fairly unpleasant ideas.

WHAT YOU _WONT_ FIND:

1. Bashing of any one at any time. (Except Van's lack of foresight but he deserves that.)  
>2. Abusive child hood trauma. (Any trauma you perceive was dealt to Raven he quite enjoyed)<br>3. No super nasty, over hyped, Prozen. (I can't help it. I really rather like the guy. Seems like pretty reasonable company to me.) Any mentions of said Minister will be more mundane than you're likely used to. (See '_Our Father_' for a better idea)

* * *

><p>Chapter 1: <em>In which Van questions military competence<em>.

Van, in later years, would be renowned for monumentally stupid decisions, amazing coincidence and an odd ability to turn near death experiences into incidents of good fortune. When he was in his twenties he'd have countless opportunities to replay, to dumbstruck audiences, how his "_let's shoot Van out of a giant canon_" strategy was legendarily effective (while always noting that Raven had backed the suicidal idea at the time perhaps a little_ too_ energetically). At fifteen, fourteen-ish technically, he had not so many medals or victories to his name but he had started the tradition off with tremendous zeal.

"I know Zeke, I know," he grumbled while the little Zoid whined loudly through the speakers, "today sucks."

The Shield Liger was clunking so clumsily about the desert Van almost felt a little embarrassed for it which was perhaps why he was out alone. He kept replaying his defeat of Rosso and Viola, protecting the Wind Colony, kicking ass at Red River, saving that Zoid from Irvine at the ruins, wrangling Zeke away from the Valley of the Rarehertz, making it snow with Dr D… all the cool, awesome, things he'd managed to achieve in the past few months since finding Zeke. He had them tallied proudly up in his head in nearly obnoxious detail and he wanted to focus on them.

Not on how thoroughly he'd gotten thrashed, twice now, by Raven.

He had a lot of angry little titles for Raven; _Psycho_ when he was feeling lazy, _Weirdo_ on occasion, and _Zoid Killer_ if he was particularly ancy. He cringed at the instant replay that had been running over and over in his head of Raven bitch slapping his Shield Liger off a cliff. Van groaned, slumping, planting his forehead stubbornly against the command console of the Shield Liger. Even with Moonbay's help, Zeke recovered and Fiona's consolations the Liger still wasn't back up to tip top condition and neither was Van. He could hear every single word Raven had told him, every single time he'd laughed at him, and see every bad ass maneuver Raven had pulled he couldn't match or see coming. Irvine's laughing at him, his insistence that Van needed a good kick up the pants to humble him, didn't help even if he knew full well the Merc had his back. Van was prone to sulking, surprisingly, and he intended to do quite a lot of it by his lonesome today.

He'd seen Raven twice in a span of a about twenty-four hours: from their running in at the village protected by Major Ford, to Raven's thrashing him, to Van's sneaking into the heavily guarded Imperial check point to fling himself at Raven for another chance to throw down the gauntlet, to…Raven thrashing him _again_. He knew virtually nothing about the other kid, he probably should've been more curious about his Organoid and the fact Raven clearly knew what and Organoid was, but in that very short span of time the kid had made an impression. Van had almost heard his victory music start building during that second battle, all ready for him to deliver that killer final punch that would send Raven running with his tail between his legs, and he'd been so sure he could do it too. Maybe he'd been a little cocky but damn it the good guy was supposed to win! Right? Right…?

"Maybe we should go back," Van conceded, "at the moment I think the only thing that's gonna help my mood is lunch. What do you think Zeke?"

The Organoid crooned, sulked, in that '_whatever_' tone that fell heavily into use when they were thoroughly disparaged.

"I feel your pain Buddy," he promised heartily, "we'll get em! Somehow…"

Zeke didn't seem convinced and really Van wondered if he was. Never mind. He'd bounce back eventually or Dr D would pull his cheeks for it or Irvine would beat some sense into him or Moonbay would fill up the hole in his gut with delicious-ness…. Van's stomach protested at the idea and he decided that now was, indeed, the time to stop wandering and sulk back to camp. Not that he thought Irvine would believe him if he said he'd been thinking diligently about strategy the whole time.

Van slumped back into his command seat, flicked up the speed and scanned the horizon for the clearest way back round to camp. The good thing about being a Republican sand runt was that he knew his way around the subtle landmarks of the desert without much effort.

He hit an outcrop of stone, a ledge, in his own personal short cut designed to crisscross back over previously untouched territory on the way back out of the sand that kept him rather blind of the depth of the drop he was coming up on till he hit the top of the slope. Hover boarders as a rule didn't have much of a fear of heights, Van especially, so the drop when revealed didn't bother him so much. What bothered him was the Zoids clustered in the canyon below.

"Oh snap…" Van reeled breathily at the observation.

It was like a Zoid Christmas! A convention of like-minded Zoids! A family reunion of Zoids! Or all of the above and their plus ones dropped in for tea at a very large stadium promising free booze. Van exhaled heavily, falling into those delirious cowboy whooping sounds he tended to make when flabbergasted.

Lordy how did you get that many Zoids out there without somebody popping the secrecy balloon? They were in the middle of a war, the Empire and the Republic were crawling all over the place, Van found it strange to think no Redlers had flown over head and gone (just casually over the radio); "_Oh golly guys there's a shit load of Zoids out here for no reason. Seriously! Like a thousand! You gotta see this! Bring Kylie!_" cause Van certainly would've.

They were diverse specimens at that. Van could make out half beaten Zabre Fangs, rusting Command Wolves, a whole scrap yard of injured or aging or just random Zoids from both sides of the border snapping at each other idly under the sun. Rarehertz maybe? Nah they were way too far from the Valley of the Rarehertz for that… Definitely weren't an army unit, or an entire army (though with this many that was a reasonable definition), maybe scraggly Sleepers? Yeah definitely. Well thank goodness Sleepers didn't attack unless provoked!

Well, Van was just going to turn promptly back around and get the heck out of _that_ mess before-

A heldigunner gave a groan, a hiss, at the Shield Liger's retreating form and let off a round of ammunition at him almost crumbling the ledge he was perched on.

_Oh shit! _

Sleeper's didn't shoot unless provoked, Van quoted, so he was looking in on a siesta of itchy, cranky, wild Zoids (weren't the Military supposed to rally those up? Darn economy!).

Yeah Van's brain stopped working quickly after that and he and Zeke turned tail to bolt immediately. The only intelligible internal dialogue between Van's ears for the next few seconds went something like this:

_Shit. Fuck, shit, fuck! Run! RUN MOTHERFUCKER RUN!_

"Oh crap, oh crap!" Van found himself muttering insistently as he applied the thrusters to make back off the ledge. He could hear the pack moving, firing off rounds, and from all the noise they were giving off he had the, very bad, inkling that the Zoids were going to follow him.

Now Van had been called a lot of things in his life, 'dummy' frequently, but contrary to popular belief while kicking ass was great Van was _not_ stupid enough to think taking on a massive posse of Zoids alone was genius. His first choice was to run, fast, preferably while screaming and swearing in a general holler white trash enough to merit a time slot on daytime Republican TV. His second choice was to bury himself alive and hide. Then and only then did turning to face the mass of angry wild Zoids become viable. So for the meantime Van focused on Step One.

He'd never hated his rear camera link more than those few moments watching the seething mass of mechanics come up in a wave along the sand bar after him. He pushed the thrusters hard but the whole thing was clunky, even with Zeke, the Shield Liger was all stumbles from its recent damage.

"This is going to get messy Buddy," Van cringed still holding the thrusters down with such force his palm was starting to ache. He hadn't had carpal tunnel this bad since his last four hour stint on the hover board.

He scanned for all the important things as the mental swearing lessened (because throwing out the obscenities was a general man reaction in Elemia): could he reach anyone on the radio? No. Was help nearby? Nope. Convenient ruins to hide in? Nadda. Super powers to give him the upper hand? Zilch. Van was staring down the barrel at a long hard haul and that looked to be the long and the short of it. Short end of the stick jokes commenced.

So Van turned, because being bit in the butt was never the way to face your problems, and steadied himself for an onslaught. Zeke grumbled, the Liger gave a roar, the first of the hulking Zoids bounded in and Van felt his stomach wobble weakly. Yeah, no, he was _way_ too inexperienced for this. Give him four more years and a big bad victory under his belt and he'd take on an army fearlessly (two of Hiltz' actually) but not at fourteen. This had to register as child abuse.

The first wave was, literally, like getting slapped in the face (hard, by your mother, at four in the morning) and it left Van reeling for a second as the Liger rattled. Luckily for Van the shield liger was nothing if not a sturdy piece of heavy machinery. A large center of gravity made it hard to topple or ram over even with a Red Horn. It was a good Zoid to cushion him and Zeke did the best he could to lead the swerve of Van's attacks and the amount of energy expended. If Van had been in a lighter model he wouldn't have been so well equipped for the proverbial reigning down of hell.

The Zoids were in varying states of disrepair. Most of them were obviously too old or injured to be of any use to either lazy army which was, doubtless, why they were roaming free like the Gordos Van had saved. Only about half of them had ammunition and not much of it. Nearly all of them had some wound an experienced pilot could've quickly exploited. None of them for that matter were particularly advanced in their strategy but when the strategy was '_massive dog pile on the little guy!_' did you really need much more to have Van on the defensive?

The real difficulty here lay in the endurance of it. Van could swipe, dodge, cackle and get his excitable energy up. For a while it was almost a breathless, near death, kind of fun but Van had dealt in skirmishes till now not long drawn out campaigns. This was going to be the later. This was soldier work not Merc work.

Van lurched in the harness, head nearly smacking soundly against some electronics, stomach flipping as one Red Horn actually did succeed in getting right under him and flopping him onto his side. He scrambled to get up, which was awkward at best without a Red Horn trying to mount you like a bitch, and found himself letting off a round of missile fire to force the Zoid back so he could get back onto his feet.

Well there went two of his missiles, he rued, the Shield Liger only had six tops and there were what: eight hundred and ninety nine more Zoids to go? Just brilliant. Today was a Wednesday wasn't it?

Van got more than a few bumps in the first moments, mainly to his cranium and his elbows from all the rattling of the cockpit, half the battle was keeping the Liger upright like he was a bobbing little boat at sea. Zeke was probably the only force that made that little note possible while Van focused all his energies on the general scratching, biting and clawing of everything else in the dog pile amassed around him.

After the initial flailing Van started to feel the rhythm of it build up in his bones: the Zabre there had a weak knee joint, the Command Wolff there practically no armor, the canon tortoise there just needed a knock off its feet and it wouldn't be able to get back up… It was sort of like a video game he'd played once, some tourists from the Empire had the little hand held console in their truck and one of the village boys had nicked it for the amusement of everyone. In less than a week the rough boys of the Wind Colony had broken the thing but Van had gotten a few good scores once he got the hang of prioritizing targets in the waves of enemies.

Between his palpitating heart and the bruising he found he was almost enjoying himself. He was Van Flyheight after all, how could he not? He had half thoughts of his father taking on three Zoids at once and Raven beating a unit by himself, in-between a particularly awesome head butt he dolled a Dark Horn, but they came and went quickly. So did the dwindling morning too. He hardly noticed the sun move till it was high in the sky and he was sweating, his arms aching, the whole cockpit steamy from the lulling energy that rendered the air con majorly useless.

Van needed lunch, breakfast too, half a case of water and a bathroom break soon but he had the oddest feeling he wasn't going to get one.

"They just keep coming!" He whined hoarsely. (All his 'yee-ha!'-ing had stripped most of his vocal cords in the first two hours.)

A Helldigunner nipped the back of the Liger and Van felt the water tank stashed there rupture well before the warning light starting flashing on the console. He groaned. God damn it! This whole thing was becoming less and less fun as it dragged. Where the hell were the others? Surely they'd be looking for-

"Fuck!" he felt his whole world spin and he was sure he'd broken a bold vessel somewhere when something, god knew what, got a good bitch slap in at the cockpit of the Shield Liger. "Ow! OW!"

His hand flailed off the controls and he could feel the puffiness rising around his eye as he blinked around the blood. Zeke wined and pushed the Shield Liger forward but there wasn't much room to move in the horde. Van heard the sensors blaring and noticed, squinting, the almighty crack in the cockpit.

"Oh Moonbay is so not going to be happy about that!" The repair bill would be covered by Van's dinners for the next _month_.

One, two, three more down.

"_Argh!_"

Apparently one of the canon tortoises still had ammunition.

The Shield Liger hit the ground and one or more of them rolled it, stomped it, and several things compounded at once: the water tank was thoroughly shot so much so it came clean off the back, the cockpit ruptured at the fault and thick Plexiglas assaulted Van along with dust and rocks as the Zoid got flipped, the Shield liger's damage sensors flared everywhere, the controls got mashed in the roll, and Van knew (from a childhood of breaking things) that'd he'd broken more than one bone somewhere in his side.

Zeke was hardly audible under all the noises, no longer muffled by the canopy of the cockpit, the roars, the shrieks, the wind, the damage sensors screaming… but Van could feel the Organoid's mind in the back of his flailing. If Zeke had been a person at that moment Van imagined he would've been a small boy, running with his hands up, screaming; _'We're all gonna die! We're all gunna die!' (_Thomas would cement the image clearly when Van eventually made his acquaintance.)

"That was not cool!" Van hollered, coughing, as the Shield Liger made progressively slower and more jolting motions. It was hard enough to see with the blood in his eyes, through the pain, with the Zoids kicking up dirt.

"Hold on Zeke!" he ordered though Organoid still felt frantic at the back of his head. "Keep it together! I am _not_ dying on an empty stomach!"

Or a virgin, definitely didn't want to die a virgin, Van was yokel enough to know that with absolute certainty. Even Zeke gave a little mental whimper of approval at that one but Van decided it best they keep that to themselves if they lived.

Then shit got real messy. Van's head got just as bad about then too. Maybe it was blood loss, heat stroke, dehydration, exhaustion or all of the above but either way he got dizzy, real dizzy, and blinking like a rabbit in head lights tried to keep his heavy forearms moving.

Van was not the kind of kid to pull out of a brawl or to leave his first Zoid dying in the dust but when he was sure something, probably muscle, had torn in one of his calves he seriously considered taking Zeke and jetting it. He wasn't proud he thought about abandoning the Liger to save himself but he wouldn't have been human, and brain tumor-less, if the thought didn't cross his mind just once (or twice).

Looking back he guessed it would've been better if he'd known he was on the last ring of the Zoids but losing consciousness he didn't think even that knowledge would've helped. Van blacked out before the end however, despite his best efforts, and left on his own there wasn't much Zeke could do to protect his squishy body in the combat.

When the Shield Liger hit the ragged sand, Van half upside down in the harness and dripping fluids onto the grain, Zeke came unstuck from the Zoid likewise and lulled on the ground uselessly. Zeke was a little Zoid, he didn't have a very big battery, and heaving on the dirt there wasn't the slightest chance he had the boost necessary to scoop up Van and run for help. He huffed, exhausted, sand flourishing over his snout and let his internal systems put him into a REM Recovery mode. Zeke needed it. Whether Van would be there when he woke up or not wasn't of much interest to his internal systems, love him as he might, Zeke's base instinct was still to conserve himself in order to protect his original mistress: Fiona.

* * *

><p>Not all that far away Moonbay and Irvine had decided that if Van wanted to sulk like a girl on her period then he could make his own lunch. He was a big girl after all and they'd be damned if they were saving him his share when he rather frequently ate most of theirs combined. Van's absence into the midday heat and then the early afternoon caused concern for the most part in Fiona and rather strictly limited to her.<p>

Moonbay had plenty of brothers and sisters, thirty-two to be precise, and if there was anything she knew it was that: boys were crybabies and men always came back for dinner. Irvine likewise was parental enough in his experience to put it down to Van's moodiness and resolved, quietly, that if the brat didn't come back by midnight he'd go drag him home. It soothed Fiona a little for that, especially when they made camp after Irvine's threats to abandon Van altogether and make the little squirt catch up to them, but she was still uncomfortable.

Fiona didn't immediately have a bad feeling, not a big one, she was only psychic when it really mattered. Zoidian frugalness didn't want her getting tingly over every little thing. Still she resolved not to sleep till Van came back or Moonbay made her.

* * *

><p>Ironically for all involved, and fortunately for some, Raven was just as good at sulking as Van and tended to enjoy the same wanderings cross country. What Raven had to sulk about was irrelevant. He was a moody, selfish, kind of brat with too many passing fancies to keep track of every minor annoyance or insult which sent him into a tantrum or off into the desert. Whatever encouraged him to abandon Marcus' unit and roam he wouldn't remember it a mere few hours later.<p>

He had intended to retrace the course from the conquered village to the little mountain where Shadow had waited out for him when they were separated. Shadow however was much more perceptive than Zeke, considering the lifestyle he'd been slotted into called for such, and no more than four clicks into their leisurely amble started clicking his jaw up at Raven.

"What now?" He sighed flicking up the comm. to let the speakers carry his voice harshly down to the trailing Organoid at the foot of the Zabre.

Shadow gave a hiss, a sniff, and started veering off course. It couldn't have been anything urgent or the Organoid would've released its wings but the little weapon was clearly excited enough to raise Raven's attentions. The boy considered ignoring him, more out of spite than anything else, but he got an inkling over their mental vibe that suggested Sleepers. Raven could never turn down a fight, especially not a good rumble, and if Shadow had sniffed out another batch of Sleepers Raven might actually have an enjoyable way to pass the afternoon (because, really, nothing said spring fun quite like mass destruction).

"Better be something good his time." He warned the bot firmly. "I swear, if it's more bloody cannon fodder, I might slip into a boredom coma."

Shadow gave a little croon up at him in satisfaction, half preening himself, and beckoned Raven on with that smugly swishing, cat like, tail.

His expectations raised Raven was appropriately sour when Shadow led him to a shambling, dead but still twitching, horde of wild Zoids heating up under the sun. He tossed his head back in a little sigh. Shadow cooed.

"Yes, they're dead, awesome." Raven snorted. "You do understand it's more fun if they're _alive_ right? Useless fucking…"

Shadow snorted heartily through his snout and mounted the body of the nearest downed Command Wolf to hop off along into the mess of parts. Obviously the Organoid had something particular in mind it wanted to present to him and diabolical enough not to be above grave robbing or dumpster diving (whatever you might consider it) Raven followed.

The mashing of electronics under the Zabre made progress slow but there was something satisfying about squishing the last life out of the twitching mechanisms as he went (especially those with the obnoxiously creative paint jobs). Really Raven was just a little kid who needed an ant farm, a magnifying glass and one of daddy's big boots to frolic away an afternoon.

Shadow bounded easily up the flank of a newly ruined Shield Liger happily, tail swishing, when Raven had thoroughly penetrated the heart of the pile. The Organoid crooned loudly like a fat cat proudly presenting it's, rather underwhelmed, master with its latest dead bird. Raven had owned a cat like that once, or Prozen had, and it was as eyebrow raising now at fourteen as it had been when Duchess the Persian had done to ten year old Raven.

"Looks like stupid's," Raven conceded in appraisal, and Shadow bounced with a purr that rumbled up and down his spine.

Raven pondered, blinking, and Shadow purred stubbornly.

"No way." Raven grinned.

Shadow bounced on his back legs tauntingly. If the Organoid could've said '_yes way!_' it would've.

"Ha!" He scoffed. "Serves the dumbass right!"

Raven only half realized he was unbuckling his harness. It was more smug instinct that drove him to throw off the belts, unlock the canopy, and leap down into the sand with Shadow for a closer look at the carcass. Shadow slipped down the cracked blue hull to press up beside Raven's hip, tail still twitching, as the pair of them rounded on the decimated cockpit for a full inspection.

"Well he shouldn't be annoying any one for a while." Raven supposed calmly as his hand traced the damage of the head armor eagerly.

He liked sucking up every little detail of this ruin after that Van punk had so thoroughly bothered him. His pleasure was childish and almost jovial _till_ he rounded the corner.

He'd expected the Zoid to be abandoned but when he spotted the silver Organoid lulling limply on the earth he took half a step back. His eyes darted, despite his instruction, over to the cockpit for signs of life and-

Oh _yuck_…

Van, that was his name, wasn't it? Looked very, very, dead in the hardness. Yet somehow, whether from years of training or a more supernatural sense, Raven was quite certain he was still alive.

The boy's whole body was contorted, hanging at ridiculous angles as the wind ruffled it. Dirt clung to the limbs, bone stuck out, wounds marred most of everything, and there was pus thick blood dripping down him onto the ground. _Disgusting_. The blood however, of everything, was truly dreadful somehow especially when the body twitched.

Raven inhaled sharply and turned his whole body away as he clutched himself. Shadow, on the other hand, squeezed past him to sniff at the sight curiously. The Organoid had never been one to shy away, frightened, by violence and neither, truthfully, had Raven but there was something about the brutality of it that ruffled his metaphorical feathers bad puns excluded.

This stupid, dopey, boy was a painfully bright picture of the _ideal young man_ that Raven was very much distanced from and to see him so starkly desecrated was…unnatural? Unsettling maybe? Raven saw a little of something then, something he sort of half remembered, a sweet man's face, or two, and gore and blood and nastiness and screaming and… He inhaled slowly at it. He'd seen a lot of that as a Prozen Knight but this was much foggier in his recollection and it snapped at him painfully. He pushed the thoughts, memories maybe, down to think instead about what to do.

_Well stop acting like a girl for one thing_. He chided himself. It was just blood. He'd seen lots and _lots _of it. This was stupid. He fought against the nausea twisting his stomach, hand pressed firmly to his navel through the combat suit, and let the more animalistic functions of his mind whirr on.

Raven had a lot of immediate inclinations in his head this way or that about exactly what to do with his fallen _Republican_ nuisance. The boy, pathetic as he was, certainly qualified as his natural enemy being on the other side of the explicitly drawn battlefield lines but for the first time in a very long time he felt a little rustle of uncertainty inside him. He'd been taught to look after himself, to be practical, to be useful and independent and he'd always been proud of how little he needed for adults or assistance but for a moment he would've very much liked someone to tell him exactly what to do.

When he thought about it, rationally, he could hear Prozen telling him, plainly, to end the poor creature's suffering and that it would be no great loss on the world to lose another cocky, ridiculous, Republican. He could often hear Prozen's voice directing him after all these years, he seemed to know exactly what his mentor, his guardian, would say, and he had no doubt Prozen would have him dispatch the runt like so many wounded deer. There was an odd little voice inside him though urging him against that however. Not so much in words but in a cold, uneasy, feeling twisting his gut. It was a pronounced sensation not really capable of coherent reasoning like Prozen's strong, dependable, voice in his ear but it was somehow persuasive. Where it had emerged from he wasn't sure considering how quickly it had arrived on the scene.

_Why on Zi are you hesitating? _He grumbled, breathing, his feet still refusing to turn him back around.

The way he saw it he had three or more options:

Finish the sorry little brat himself with Shadow's help and make it as quick and painless as he wanted (or didn't).

Leave him to wither alone or for his hopeless gaggle of friends to find.

Help him.

The concept of helping anyone seemed very foreign after ten years in the Empire…

Raven couldn't remember anything clearly, not that he often tried, of before he was a scraggly boy on Prozen's hip being taught how to kick asses. He didn't think he'd ever really been told how to help anyone other than himself, or Prozen's interests, and he didn't think it had ever been expected of him to do so. Hanna, Hardin, Moura… all of the other Knights were expected to look after him, the soldiers in the common ranks to fall in line around his whims, the commanders to give themselves up to their medics and Shadow, like the Knights, to die defending Raven rather than the reverse.

He wavered for a long time, fists clenching and fingers easing, glancing over his shoulder and then back to the horizon expecting Van's dimwitted friends to manifest at a moment's notice and pluck the damn decision right out of his hands. He hoped, a little, that the boy's haggard breathing might just stop and serve the same purpose in relieving him.

Shadow was becoming impatient, they hadn't worked together very long, and new to Raven's moods the Organoid couldn't know exactly what his master would want instinctively. Raven had seen Ambient and Specula act entirely without instruction if they knew, or were almost sure, that what they were undertaking was something their masters would want but Shadow wasn't quite there yet. Instead he prodded his snout, gently like the boy might break, at Raven's tense hand for some kind of command. Raven didn't have to speak it, given the Zoid seemed to know what he was thinking and vice versa, but as he didn't know what he wanted anyway Shadow was left to prod him a little longer. Raven didn't like sharing his mind with Shadow yet but he could still feel the Organoid searching his conscious and it only served to irritate the itch further.

"Oh stop it!" He hissed eventually at the thing, raising his hands to bury his face in them for a moment while Shadow crumpled back snorting.

The Organoid appeared a little offended but stomped back closer, butting his nose against Raven's hip, rubbing it against his side like a nuzzle. He'd seen Organoids comfort too, Specula would come right up and nestle Reese's chubby cheeks, but this was the first time Shadow had conceded to attempt.

Raven sighed, letting his hands fall loose, one arm draping compromisingly round Shadow's neck. The Organoid was surprised but shuffled closer. It didn't coo like Raven suspected that hulking monstrosity Zeke might but he had the sense Shadow still thought of him as a child, or young, or something equally primal with the same definition. Still he wasn't totally foreign to comfort and he approved of Shadow's manly, rather uncomfortable, efforts.

"What do you think?" Consulting the Zoid was another first. Raven chided he might as well ask the bloody Zabre what it thought!

Shadow hissed low and twisted his long neck back to where Van and Zeke lay sprawled bloody in the sand. His tail swished quickly, his jaws snapped, and Raven had that unspoken knowledge that the Organoid saw the other set as a threat to himself and his charge. Raven wondered briefly if Shadow was more Prozen's idea of a body guard than a present…

"I know," he admitted, he wanted to relish in destroying the punk too. That sort of thing was his favorite hobby. "I don't want to though."

As he admitted it he felt ridiculous but Shadow passed no judgment, thank everything, so he let the embarrassment at revealing his indecision to the creature lessen. It was the first time he'd told Shadow something so honestly and the Organoid was working hard to establish that vital trust that was very slowly blooming (Raven being as difficult about it as he was).

"I doubt he knows anything useful at all," Raven snorted fumbling for an excuse _not_ to let him die very aware in the reverse Van might have the opposite problem, "I doubt that country bumpkin knows how to count his toes."

Shadow hummed, rumbled, and growled low in approval at that.

"We should just leave him."

Shadow rumbled again, tilting his head back to the limp bodies, in another sound agreement.

"Argh…" Raven spat turning away. He'd only forced himself to making hasty, tiny, glances at Van the gore still biting at him. "This is fucking… it's not my problem… survival of the fittest… weaklings…all that…"

The words _should've_ been much stronger. Should've, could've, would've counted for shit though as Hardin would say.

"If Prozen finds out…" He murmured, though he didn't see why anyone should ever find out if he did the unthinkable, "he'd…"

Oh he wouldn't be angry, no, Raven didn't think that for a moment. It wasn't like the kid mattered. Prozen might be disappointed at his uncharacteristic show of mercy though, confused, and give him that puzzled expression that would say he no longer completely understood Raven. Which the boy wasn't sure he could take. He didn't really trust Shadow yet, or anyone else, but he trusted Prozen and Prozen's judgment and this would be exiting that sphere, which was all he knew, entirely. His foot bounced, boots hitting the stone, and he threw his head back to sigh again.

No one had to know. Shadow wasn't likely to gossip. Who would the punk tell who actually mattered either? (Assuming he lived even with Raven's help) Van would never get to so much as look at Prozen in person let alone confess Raven's one good deed of the decade.

It frustrated him heartily and Raven hissed, stomping his foot, groaning like the effort of giving into the stupid idea made him feel sick before he pivoted back to face the idiot.

"I'm losing my mind." He decided. Half closing his eyes, hand clutching his hips, as he moved closer. "I'm losing my goddamn mind."

Shadow gave an almost disapproving sound, like the Organoid very much didn't see the point of this but felt it compulsory to play along, and followed him tightly. What sort of damage Shadow suspected Zeke might do in this condition Raven hadn't the foggiest but the black Zoid still pushed ahead of him to pin the little silver one's unconscious form down.

"You just don't want to help me with the idiot." Raven accused saucily as Shadow all but sat on Zeke like a squatting mother hen.

Shadow growled at the dull creature beneath him, as if demonstrating to Raven that, no, the silver thing was dangerous and needed minding. Unconvinced and displeased Raven let it be with a scoff for good measure and crept a little closer to the cockpit.

He had never been worried about bodies before. Hanna had once thought it would be good fun for him to accompany her around the medical bay as part of a hand-to-hand '_excursion_'. She'd shown him the effect of certain moves, as demonstrated by the injured patients she jostled, and the organs those maneuvers affect as demonstrated by the corpses she used to illustrate. Raven had thought the whole affair was _awesome_. Hanna had a practical eye for everything that he relished but crouching down to try his first attempt at freeing Van from the harness he felt that familiar nausea swelling up.

He fumbled with the harness for a moment, more trying to see the tangles than unfasten it, Van's blood moistening his gloves. That was all well and good, Raven thought he'd be fine now for a moment, until more blood fell from the boy's ruined face onto Raven's. Spluttering he fell back like someone might've slapped him and gave Shadow a thorough fright in the process.

"Fuck me!" Raven groaned. He was acting like a prissy idiot. Inhaling stoutly, arming himself, he smacked his hand firmly against his cheek till his ears rung and dove back under the unconscious Republican.

He had Van free in moments, though Raven was messier for it with the little trails of blood that ran down his face, and pushing himself back he let Van's body slump out of the seat. The boy sort of fell the last foot, thanks to beautiful gravity, onto the ground and moaned pitifully at it. Raven congratulated himself and took Van's little moans of pain as reward for his straightening up.

He looked the boy over and realized, easily, that there wasn't a snow ball's chance in hell that he could carry him. They were clearly about the same age and height but the Republican brat was stockier than him, heavier and broader, against Raven's more naturally wiry frame. Raven knew a diet of protein shakes and vitamin pills probably hadn't helped his weight but Raven cursed Van for the newest difficulty instead. Republicans were bred like bulls.

Treat him now or drag him? Raven considered. He was going to do more harm dragging him so was it really worth mending anything yet? Probably not he decided coolly. Next question: where was he dragging the dumbass' soon-to-be corpse to?

"Shadow find somewhere we can camp," he snapped, and the Organoid whined pointedly.

Shadow gestured to Zeke beneath him and Raven huffed.

"The thing's a glorified paper weight! What's it going to do? Cry at me?" He supposed with tremendous levels of snark. "Go! Shoo! Be useful!"

Shadow grumbled low, growling and hissing, giving Zeke a solid kick to the face as unclipped his wings and pushed off the carcass of the other Zoid.

This was going to be a dreadful day, Raven just knew, he'd already started down the most ridiculous course he'd ever embarked on…

He found himself biting his nail between fine teeth, through the thin worn glove, after a moment of Shadow's circling overhead and promptly stopped himself. He rubbed his dirtied palms along the sides of his thighs and shuffled the thoughts in his head irritably. He still felt sick, quaky and weak to his bones. It jostled him like he might puke and those silly images found every spare second to rumble at his memory in tandem. This whole thing riled him in funny ways, ways it shouldn't have affected him, but stubborn as he was Raven decided firmly not to think about it.

Raven was very good at not thinking about things he didn't like, like: human rights, children's services regulations, professional sports teams, the military code of conduct…

Instead he made himself a promise. Pushing all thoughts of mending up the dumbass aside, pushing down all the funky memories, effectively ignoring everything, Raven promised himself that he'd do something damn fun for himself when this was over with. There'd be a home cooked meal after this campaign, at the very least, even if he had to stoop to cooking it himself. Heaven forbid.

His being there was, arguably, good fortune for Van but the languid lack of urgency in Raven's reluctant mercy promised more painful manhandling for Van than sympathetic coddling.

It was definitely a Wednesday.

* * *

><p>Notes:<br>Hanna and the Prozen Knights are both from the Manga  
>Elemia is the desert where the Wind Colony is located and, again, got that from the manga<p>

AN: Hope somebody enjoyed even if it was just a giggle. I hope especially Jameis has enjoyed part 1 and while I have no immediate idea of when part two will be out I hope by keeping chapters reasonably small they can be fairly regular.

Criticism and opinions welcomed heartily. Flames not so much. If you're bothered by the path this is headed in pairing wise, I get it, I respect that, but kiddies you can jump ship well before you get to that review button.

Have a good one guys.


	2. In which Van suspects dying would've

AN: Hey guys, if you're here again it's great to see you! Same warnings from last chapter still apply including a minor warning that, yes, Raven is a _massive_ jackass. I love the kid but you honestly can't deny that. Hell I think everyone's more or less a jackass at that age.

Enjoy

* * *

><p>Chapter 2;<em> In which Van suspects dying would've been kinder<em>

The whole process of setting up camp was troublesome at the best of times but when you had to drag something like sixty kilos of _idgit_ and his giant paper weight it became inexplicably worse. Raven's lazy sense of human decency almost threw in the towel right there and then because if saving people was such hard work didn't want a bar of it. He suddenly had a great understanding for why Prozen had shot for Minister of Defense rather than Minister for Health in the first place.

Raven liked making messes not cleaning them up and Van definitely fell under the category of '_mess_' right about now. He was less human looking and more… squishy after his little tenderization by the horde. Sweaty, irritable and running short on daylight Raven found Van's pain at least mildly satisfying but when he finally got the punk, the Organoid and the Zabre all set up he just wished the little mongrel would stop breathing already from blood loss. Little bastard was only persisting, he was sure, to piss the rest of the world off with his continued existence. If Raven had been a nicer person, which he wasn't, he would've prattled something quietly to himself about Van's super human will to live but instead he kicked Zeke's dull head as he fumbled for the med kit.

Imperial med kits were Grade A quality, especially for a Knight, because it was sort of assumed they'd need half a hospital in the back of their cockpits. Absolutely none of the equipment was Republican either because, again, it was assumed Prozen didn't want his Knights contracting tetanus. Raven had to heft the thing over his shoulder to dismount from the Zabre and then, weak armed, throw it heavily against the stone beside Van with an almighty crash that rumbled through the little cave right out the gaping mouth.

Shadow stuck his head, owlishly, round the open rim of the cave entrance at the sound and Raven waved him off.

Settling cross legged beside Van he gave the boy a glance from head to toe as though he was a fish to fillet. Hanna had always said to go for the most critical injury first and as Raven wasn't a brain surgeon he supposed he'd have to go for Van's second most immediate injury. Picking that zone was a little more difficult. He wasn't bleeding _profusely_ anywhere, though he was bleeding steadily, so there were at least a few stitches to deal out and more than a few wounds to disinfect. Raven could tell something was sprained or worse in the arm too when he prodded it hard enough that Van gave an unconscious squeal like a chew toy.

He settled for feeling out the arm a little more, definitely something not right inside that downy limb for sure considering the delightful noises Van was making in protest. Raven bent the limb a little and Van's legs gave an uneven bucking flex as he made a choked, breathless, sound. It was a good sound, the movement made Raven suspect there was something a little off in one of Van's legs as well, so he bent the limb again unnecessarily for the hell of it.

"_Argh!_" Van sounded like he was choking and Raven hoped he was. He hadn't checked the Republican's airways for vomit so it was entirely possible. "Ow!"

Van's face contorted pathetically and Raven supposed he was waking up.

"Ow! Ow!" He murmured, body tensing, limbs twitching trying to remove his tortured arm from Raven's inspection as the Imperial caught sight of a rather nasty blood bruise blossoming on the forearm.

"Oh shut up," Raven mulled nastily, and gave the other a good whack in the forehead with the heel of his palm till Van hissed, grimacing, and lay back.

"You trying to kill me?" Van panted though he was no doubt a little delirious.

"I wish." He sighed. "I'm helping."

"Doesn't feel like helping!" The Republican spat.

"Excuse me while I search for a fuck to give."

"Just leave it!" Van begged.

"Nope." Raven retorted mildly one hand slipping through the med kit. "Playing doctor. So be good and play dead."

The Republican whimpered slumping back against the sleeping roll Raven had hefted him onto in reluctant submission. Van definitely wasn't running away and teasing him senseless certainly helped Raven rebel against that crushing vein of sympathy that had urged him to help the punk in the first place. This made him feel much more like himself. This was fun.

Van strained under the pain when Raven made to stint him up. It was the closest thing the Republican was getting to a cast out here especially considering Raven knew very little about how to mend bone breaks or fractures in the long run. Van had better of hoped that the injury was minor or in the not too distant future he might be paying someone to re-break and re-set whatever he had damaged and Raven had fucked over. Still the other teen obviously eased when Raven left the arm alone.

Raven gave the young man another sweep and found there was glass to pick from wounds, gashes to clean and cuts to sew shut. Oh this would be good.

"No!" Van snapped as Raven clutched his other arm. "No more acting like a psycho!"

"If you want to die of an infection," Raven supposed, "by all means, be my guest. I've never seen anyone get gangrene. We can clean it out with maggots in a few days maybe, that would be cool, never seen that either. Sounds good to me all up. What do you think Shadow?"

Shadow stuck his head idly round the rim of the cave and nodded eagerly.

"Shadow?" Van murmured quietly forcing his good eye open into the light to cross Raven's cheeky features before groaning and lulling back. "Well now it all makes sense…"

"My charming bedside manner you mean?" He snorted.

"Call my friends." Van ordered sharply.

"Don't know how." Raven quirked merrily. "If I did or they were anywhere nearby you'd be in their loving hands rather than letting me test out my veterinarian toy kit."

"Go to hell," Van sighed, "oh wait; I think we're already there."

"So do you want to see what kind of bacteria fester in the sand or would you like me to clean you up?" The Imperial offered though his preference was evidently clear on the matter.

"Just…" the boy half cringed at the idea of more mending on Raven's part and shut his eye tightly. "Just be gentle this time…"

"Pfft," Raven snorted under his hot breath, "that'll take_ forever_…"

It did take forever actually, or at least an hour, Van kicked him unintentionally at least three times and intentionally slapped the tweezers from him twice. How the sand rat managed that during all his pained little murmurs and twisting Raven didn't know but he was sure it was a skill all its own. None the less the constant stopping and starting was trying his already tenuous patience painfully thin.

"Stop moving!" He hissed hand smacking the good side of Van's face with a sound crack.

"I can't!" The other spat. "It hurts!"

Growling Raven hefted one leg over Van's and sat himself down heavily on the other's thighs. Rolling his eyes Raven grabbed the good wrist and pinned the arm to the stone just off the sleeping roll, tweezers still clutched in his left hand, so he could properly resume picking at the gash in Van's shirt.

"What are you doing?" The Republican demanded in a weak little fluster.

"Giving you a lap dance," Raven replied mundanely before hissing quite intensely at Van's now worryingly close face. "What do you think?"

Van sighed.

"Now if you hit me again I'll turn _these_," Raven lifted the tweezers up to Van's good eye between their noses in demonstration, "on the family jewels."

The Republican got the point quickly enough after that. The unconscious, pained, flexing underneath his weight Raven could forgive as Van bit his lip harshly and tried to reign in some self-control for the sake of future little Flyheights everywhere. When Raven released his wrist, freeing both of his arms, Van dug his fingers into the bedding and allowed the other young man to resume thoroughly enjoying himself in the course of picking at each of Van's wounds.

"So how'd you dispatch all those Zoids?" The imperial inquired lazily, leaning long over the young man and stretching his spine, to turn the tweezers through the puffy, swollen, gash over Van's eye. He held the wound with one hand that stretched over the sticky forehead and fumbled for the shards of glass and gravel with the other leaving Van's moving mouth just below his neck.

"Luck I guess," Van cringed as Raven worked a particularly big piece free, the pounding of constant pain was beginning to give him a headache. "Better pilot than I thought…"

"I very much doubt that."

"Hey shut up!" The boy grumbled. "I'm going to be the best Zoid pilot in the world some day!"

"Oh, never heard _that_ one before," Raven chortled. "You and half the population of Europa."

"Well don't you want to be the best?" Van snapped.

"I _am_." He declared softly, firmly, into Van's forehead. "That's the difference. I didn't spend the last ten years dreaming. I was shedding sweat, blood and tears before while you were repeating the first grade. You don't have a snowball's chance in hell."

"One day I'm going to beat you so bad you'll go crying home to Mama." The Republican promised stubbornly and Raven was quickly finding that when you got Van worked up enough he'd lie plank stiff still.

"The day that happens pigs'll fly and I'll actually have a Mama to run crying home to." He snorted.

"You don't have a Mum?" Van replied curiously, attention thoroughly diverted, and Raven swore quietly to himself internally for the little slip.

"Adopted." Raven answered shortly, simply, conversation endingly. He hoped but Van couldn't take a hint if it was dealt with a mallet.

"War orphan?" Van guessed and Raven gave a bored little grunt. "Me too."

"Fascinating." He drawled.

"What are your adopted parents like?" Van prodded and Raven felt very sure suddenly that the Republican might not ever shut his mouth on the subject now they had something to '_bond_' over.

"Parent," Raven clarified, "and none of your blooming business."

"If you're going to mutilate me you could at least-"

"Now onto stitches," Raven purred, half falling off Van to the med kit without ever completely removing his weight.

"Shouldn't you get off?" Van supposed hopefully.

"I think I might need to stay on board for this." He smirked.

He did, of course, Van quickly learnt that. He hadn't been expecting the first jab of the surgical needle straight into the skin over his eye and bucked, screaming, swearing, so loud he almost flipped Raven off him and alerted Shadow in the process.

"Down boy!" Raven ordered though Van could hear how, Raven was sure, how badly he wanted to cackle his nasty little ass off.

"Antiseptic! Or whatever it's called!" Van cried. "Heard of it!"

"Don't have it. Sorry." Oh they both knew Raven was very much _not_sorry. He didn't even try to hide the grin but Van was grateful he at least kept the giggling under wraps. "Now, please, continue screaming like a girl."

"It fucking cains!"

"Oh you say that about everything." Raven dismissed the dramatics so casually Van could've been convinced he was crying over eating his greens.

"I'd like to see you do it!"

"Done it." The other snapped proudly. "I got the scars and everything."

"No you don't! Liar!"

Raven snorted heavily through his nose, left the needle dangling from wiry surgical thread off Van's eyebrow and fiddled purposefully with the buckle at the back of his collar. The shoulder pads had to come off, buckles had to be unfastened, the armor belt round his navel loosened just so he could tug his shirt up and down to demonstrate little marred lines of skin to the Republican.

"I was twelve when I sewed that one," Raven gestured confidently under Van's rather sickened expression, "that one's crocodile related," that was bullshit, "rock climbing accident" that wasn't bullshit but Hardin had sewed that particular line of stitching and Prozen had held him down, "and that I did last year," and it had been massively painful.

Dignity, honor, or something like that confirmed Raven tucked his shirt back in, tightened his belts, refastened his buckles and grinned down at Van's rather sickened expression.

"So," Raven offered, "can I finish? Or are you going to cry and pussy out like a girl?"

Van looked him square in the eye, grimacing, and Raven could make out the entire internal dialogue. The poor Republican had all the bravado of any other testosterone pumped teenage boy and refused to turn down a direct challenge but it _really_ hurt. Van pulled his lips back grossly, making a sour face that very much imitated a cat's arse, and unable to speak nodded vigorously instead. Raven's grin was downright vindictive.

"Water first," Van demanded quickly, voice rising octaves, as Raven plucked the needle back up.

"So you can scream yourself hoarse or puke?" Raven inquired lazily. "Trust me. Empty stomach's better for this."

Van whimpered, whining low in his throat, slumping his head back in resignation.

"Fine."

"Well if you insist~"

* * *

><p>Van would have several, thin, little white scars for the rest of his life from Raven's rather crude medical treatment but, amazingly, the wounds his tormentor had neglected to clean before sewing shut wouldn't become infected. They'd heal just fine, as would Van's arm mercifully but on that account his forearm would be the first thing to ache when he hit his eighties. Girls would tell him the little scar just over his eyebrow was cute when he turned eighteen however so that kind of helped but the next few hours with Raven deserved a reward much more substantial.<p>

"That was the worst thing that ever happened," Van muttered decidedly as Raven packed up the little torture bag he claimed were medical supplies, "I suddenly like the dentist a lot more."

"You have dentists in the Republic?" Raven teased. "I thought you just chewed dog treats."

"You're a bad person."

"Oh no, my heart is breaking."

"What heart?" Van snorted. "Water now please."

Raven was at least forthcoming with that small comfort. You didn't play around with water in the desert and when most of the planet was covered in it Republic and Imperial kids alike could respect it. Still Raven took a hearty sip himself, because torturing must've been hard work Van assumed, and then presented it to him with the cap still hanging free. Van managed to force himself up onto his elbows but maintaining his balance with one arm and drinking with another posed problems. He glanced at Raven feebly for a moment and the bastard just raised one slender eyebrow skeptically.

"Little help?"

Raven sighed but did. Still Van was sure he'd be coping flack for it later. For the moment he'd have to try and divert the attention.

"Is Zeke okay?"

"Alive," Raven shrugged, "but he might be out for days."

"Argh…" there went simple escape plan number one, "where's the Liger?"

"In the dump heap with the rest of the trash," he snorted unsympathetically.

"Is the core still…?"

"Intact," he shrugged, "but why you, or anyone, would want a mess like that I can't imagine. Oh wait, actually, I can: poverty."

"Why are you such a jerk? Didn't anybody hug you when you were little?"

"I got plenty of hugs." Raven retorted proudly. "That's why I'm a spoilt bastard."

"Darn," Van fell back gently, shuffled off his elbows really, onto the sleeping roll and brought his good hand up to his aching face. How was he supposed to get out of this one? No one knew where he was, he didn't even know where they were, Zeke was out, he was in bad shape, and the Liger was a wreck. Darn it…

"I'm stuck with you, aren't I?" Raven seemed to realize it at much the same second and the look of sheer '_oh crap_' that passed over his features made Van's heart flutter smugly enough to ease some of the pain.

"Yep," he conceded. "why are you helping me anyway?"

"This qualifies as helping?" The other appeared genuinely curious about that and Van blinked back at him for a moment's consideration.

"With a very definition sense of the word kinda…" Van trailed off and the pair of them conceded that as this didn't really count as being helpful at all Raven didn't have to explain himself properly.

* * *

><p>Van didn't retain consciousness for long after that which was definitely for the best if he wanted his health to continue improving without Raven slowing it down with tantrum induced injuries. He rolled over once or twice to mumble at Raven as he stirred the fire, or Shadow slunk inside, or the Imperial fetched himself something to drink…<p>

"Dinner?" Van asked, groggy, but hopeful.

"Yep." Raven answered letting Van glance ponderously at his mug. "All the vitamins and minerals a growing boy needs in one nutrient shake."

"Euck." He grimaced with a sound that clearly wasn't any discernible English.

"Suit yourself."

"What about real food?" Van muttered , spine easing till he was almost entirely curled back under the blanket, ready to slip back out of consciousness.

"Out." Raven informed him unsympathetically. "We've got ration bars, shakes and pills. That's it."

"I'll starve thanks," he informed him weakly twisting back over to his other side under Raven's lazy gaze. After a moment, a very short one at that, Van let out an atrocious sound that raised Shadow's head from the cave floor in a spasming twitch.

"Oh great," the Imperial rued, "he snores."

Shadow's displeased hiss barely rang out over Van's unconscious hollering.

"Should I suffocate him?"

Shadow nodded curtly.

"You've got get rid of the Organoid."

Shadow wasn't fussed by this.

"I'm not burying the body either."

The Organoid slumped back against the stone and curled a little tighter around Raven.

"Lazy git."

When it snapped at Raven the boy considered melting his Organoid down for glue but decided the creature was growing on him in this… _adversity_. Besides he couldn't imagine the Zoidians back home would appreciate his disrespect for the creature. (Ignoring Hiltz' tendency to bitch slap everything in general at the moment.) Zoidian puberty was terrifying, especially in the males, and Raven suspected he and Reece had been shuffled out of the Capital partially because Prozen didn't want any of his resources getting canned by one angry mother fucking red head. He didn't mind so much considering what he'd seen of Hiltz since the prick turned seventeen and got his first fucking period or something…

He found his mind wandering a little. The first time Hiltz had put him in a sleeper hold he'd been about ten and for a split second Prozen had thought Hiltz had broken his neck. Apparently the expression the Minister pulled was 'amazingly hilarious' and the one Raven got when he woke up was enough to make him forgive Hiltz his uncalled for babysitting tactic.

He kind of missed Reece and Hiltz out here on campaign. Hanna had the pair of them under her watchful eye since she was forced to retire from active duty. Raven had seen them almost every other day since Prozen took him in and while they had a tendency to try and main each other there was an odd affection. He missed a lot more things on campaign than he would've thought: fighting with Prozen over the hot water, Hardin's lifts to the Palace most mornings, Hanna's hollering voice messages, Zeppelin's _filthy_jokes…

Van was… Wait why had Van sauntered, uninvited, into this interior monologue again? Raven shook it off and cast another wayward glance over the body of his guest. Van was a lot of derogatory things in Raven's head but he'd succeeded in amusing him more than setting him off. That was a rarity. Someone Raven didn't lose his shit at didn't pop up every day. Even when the kid was being obnoxious and challenging him to fights he was more funny than a massive genuine pain in the ass.

If Raven was helping Van solely because of his comedic value that was probably stupidly selfish enough to make sense.

He really hoped the boy didn't expect him to explain himself at any point in detail because Raven didn't think he had many answers for anything at the moment. He couldn't trace why he was thinking half the things he was today…

Raven swallowed the last swig of the nasty fluid in his mug quickly like Zeppelin tossing back a shot, which was doubtless where he'd learned the perfect posture from, and gave Van a withering glance. Thanks to the brat he had nothing to sleep on (if he actually slept regularly he'd do something about it immediately) and-

Van wasn't snoring.

Hell Raven wasn't even sure he was breathing.

"Ah fuck," he hissed, tossing the mug down to push off his hands and investigate hurriedly.

He planted his palms on either side of the long tan body and leant in for a closer inspection. The kid was definitely not breathing.

Raven grabbed a shoulder and wrenched the boy onto his back, he was half down to stick his fingers in the snide little mouth and check the airways were clear when Van gave a snorting, piggish, inhalation and with a lurch started to snore loudly once more. Open mouthed.

"Charming." Raven spat. Fingers falling over his racing heart after they carded the flecks of saliva off his face and he settled back onto his haunches.

Racing? Raven pressed his palm to his chest, yep, his heart was pumping alright. Why on Zi had the punk gotten his blood pressure up in a few seconds of blind panic?

_Stupid has got to be contagious cause you're acting like a fool_. He chided, thoroughly tempted to slap himself, but settled for burying his face in his hands once more and scrunching up his knees.

What would the people he knew say if they'd caught that little snippet live?

_Who knows, maybe you're pregnant, makes all girls extra-emotional_. Okay, that might just be Hiltz' thoughts on the matter.

_Raven's got a boyfriend!_ Yeah, Reece wouldn't exactly be sympathetic either.

Prozen… Oh lord…

Argh, it was high time to commence self-loathing under the stars for the evening.

* * *

><p>Organoid's were <em>not<em> comfortable to sleep on. Anyone who claimed otherwise was a fat, stupendous, liar. Anyone who had ever slept on the hood of a misshapen car would understand that much. The only part of Shadow that aided sleep in mildly insomniac teenagers was the protection those wings provided from the elements aside from which the Organoid was gosh darn ineffectual. When Raven finally ambled back inside, ready to curl up in a ball of moody self-pity and sleep straight through the next twelve hours, the Zoid shuffled back from the fire and did little more than offer him a lovely patch of rock to sleep on.

Van's snoring still echoed off every goddamn surface in their little wind tunnel of a cave too. Raven grumbled. Frankly hefting up the opposing side of the sleeping bag and rolling Van right off it was monumentally tempting.

_Cockpit genius_, the voice of reason hounded and with that little flicker of brilliance Raven was out of his combat suit, curled on the reclined seat with the canopy locked so tight even Van's hollering was obscured.

Raven locked himself up so good and tight that when Van woke in the morning he was, blissfully, hopeful he was on his lonesome in the cave for a moment. That was minus the still lazing Shadow and the insistently unconscious Zeke. Van feared that the Organoid might need more Zoid Magnite but he definitely didn't have the resources to get it right now. He was stiff and messy and wounded like most of the adult males in the Wind Colony after a Friday night in harvest season. There was no way Raven was going into a volcano to find him some either unless the journey involved tossing Van in the volcano he assumed.

He was still contemplating this fate when the sun rose, slithers of heat penetrating into the cold cave, and it was starting to bubble up panic in his gut. He needed Fiona, Irvine, Moonbay… They'd help him find Magnite. They had to be looking for him. If he could just figure out how to contact them, maybe he could salvage the radio in the Shield Liger… He was thinking about it and very little else when he tried to stagger up onto his feet. Between a limping leg and a reasonably useless arm his balance was nothing if not pathetic.

Van persisted valiantly however, against the tugging of his stitches and the burning in the good leg he was hoping on, right up until he fell flat on his ass. The fractured arm was ruffled along with the bad leg because frankly he couldn't stop both of them colliding with the solid rock shelf. He wasn't totally aware of the brutal, cat like, howl he made but the furious swearing that followed was so traditional of the Rural Helic that Van was sure he'd made his ancestors proud. (Especially Great Grandpa Daniel who died in a drunken disagreement outside the Colony a meager four months after his shot gun wedding to heavily pregnant Charlene.)

He tossed onto his back weakly, lucky if nothing else, that in all this he hadn't shat his pants (it was a solid achievement, made a man a man, where he came from.). He even managed to shuffle pitifully up onto his elbows as the canopy of the Zabre clicked open and Raven presented himself to the world.

Raven's whole demeanor mildly made up for the entire, embarrassing, affair. The boy was, as far as Van could tell, wearing little more than a singlet as he draped himself like a limp fish over the edge of the cockpit. He gazed, dazedly, down at Van his hair ruffled, his lips apart, all pale and tiny and trance like. He reminded Van of a very stupefied cat as he blinked slowly down to the Republican and that image penetrated Van's imagination heartily. Oh yeah, if Raven was anything he was a smug pure bred cat asleep on a fence too out of it to properly insult the mutt stumbling about in the back yard in one of those dish-bowl collar things…

"'he fuck are you doing?" Raven slurred as Van tried not to laugh deep in his black little heart. It was so adorable he'd never let the other live it down.

"Help?" Van pleaded. "My cunning escape plan failed."

"Pfft," Raven sighed belligerently at the other's apparent lack of foresight pressing his forehead into the side column of the cockpit, "no."

"You can't just leave me here." He insisted. Though after a moment's silence he was becoming vaguely suspicious Raven had fallen back into a doze. "HEY! RAVEN! Heeeeelp!"

The pilot groaned. Yep, he'd been asleep, but his aim was still pretty damn good either way considering how the sneaker he produced from inside the cockpit collided with Van's forehead while Raven kept his face buried in his arm.

"Go 'lay outside." He ordered so softly Van hardly heard him and wouldn't have at all if he hadn't strained.

"But…" Van glanced uselessly between his current position on the hard stone and the sleeping bag. "My ass is going numb here!"

"'_hadow!_" Raven groaned.

The Organoid grumbled but unfurled from its nesting to stomp unhappily over to Van. The Republican dodged the jaws only due to a long history of running from his sister.

"Woah! Easy there buddy!"

The Organoid lunged forward again teeth tearing through the back of Van's shirt as he gathered up the material and, like a mother might heft a kitten, lifted Van by his scruff right off the ground to (gently thank God) toss him back onto the sleeping bag. He lay there, grateful and stunned, and had half risen to his elbows to thank the Organoid when it huffed at him and resumed its previous position.

"So…" Van supposed up at Raven's lulling body, "breakfast?"

Nothing. The bastard was asleep again just like his nasty Organoid.

"Oh damn ya both."

* * *

><p>When Raven finally did dismount from the Zabre Fang in his singlet and boxers, barefoot, and mildly adorable to sit cross legged about his bags Van was thoroughly disappointed with their breakfast options. The boy tore open a sachet of instant coffee and brewed it straight black in near silence over the little gas burner. He yawned, Van whined attempts at conversation which the stubborn teen ignored entirely, and sat there nursing his mug for a good ten minutes before perking up.<p>

"Food." Van repeated eventually when he supposed there was some hope of rousing Raven. "You know that thing Humans have three times a day generally before bowel movements and after manual labor? I'm sure in Hell it's a novelty to ya but up here it's kind of important." Nothing. "Hey! Raven! Food! Me! Now!"

"Shut up," the Imperial grumbled vaguely, "too early for your shit."

"I'll take anything you got. Canned spam, anchovies, olives! Anything! Come on Raven you have to subsist off something other than the tears of Orphans and bunny blood."

The boy snorted heavily through his nose, sipped his coffee, and rummaged one handed through the heavy duffle bag beside him. The protein bar he lobbed at Van wasn't any longer or wider than the boy's hand so Van wouldn't ever consider it a meal even if it had been chocolate coated and didn't taste like cardboard.

"No wonder you're so bony," Van mulled over the chewy thing, "and miserable."

"Eating requires effort I don't enjoy." Raven shrugged. "Plus cooking takes too much time to begin with."

"And I thought I had ADHD."

"Can't be bothered." He retorted bored. "Too much better shit to do."

"Seriously how long can one person survive off this stuff without going nuts? Cause there's got to be a limit."

"I dunno it's only been a month." Raven revealed lazily.

"Tell me you eat more than this when you're not out ruining other people's day for a living?" Van prodded. "Or else I've lost all hope that the Empire is populated by creatures we can negotiate with."

"Definitely." He nodded though the response was rather more dull than enthusiastic. "Three square fucking meals a day. Carefully monitored week to week by a health food conscious, paranoid, mother-fucking-hen of a first time mummy who's convinced I'm underweight and finds the kitchen _relaxing_."

"They might be right."

"I swear to God Prozen was a house wife in his past life." Raven rued in a mumble.

"Prozen…" Van pondered. "I know that name… Ain't he some big Imperial big shot? I've heard it on the radio before." They didn't really have TV in the Wind Colony or most of the rural Republic at that.

"Yep."

"Is he your Dad?" Van guessed next.

"Adopted." Raven reiterated but the life was coming back to him as the coffee set in and he stretched.

"So you're loaded."

"He's loaded. I'm an expense." The Imperial corrected and he was a greedy little expense at that. Just the way he liked it.

"Must be nice."

"Don't care." Raven shrugged. "It's just money. Not like we live all posh and traditional. Prozen doesn't care much about cash as long as there's enough of it for what he wants."

"I think my Sis wishes we had loads more but Dad didn't have much to leave behind and ya barely cover costs in farming."

"Sucks to be you," was the unsympathetic response, "I think Prozen makes like half of it from interest on the family fortune or something. It's ridiculous but so long as it's easy I suppose. I get to inherit it after all and fuck me if I'm going to be a paper pusher. I'd go insane. No wonder he rushed me through school in all those programs…"

"He's an office guy?"

"Minister," Raven shrugged without bothering to clarify if Van appreciated the term, "he likes it. Likes me out of the house where things are less delicate and I'm happier."

"Yeah I can imagine why." Van chortled. "My Sis is just like that. She'll come up with all sorts of stuff to keep me from getting bored and causing trouble. Specially when she knows she's never going to get me to sit down and read or nothing."

"Then she obviously gave up and kicked you out of town."

"Not like you can talk!" The Republican laughed. "Your old man put you on a battlefield to keep you busy!"

"Effective Parenting." Raven corrected. "I'm still supervised by his bitches, I'm busy and I'm doing something useful for him in the process. If it bothered me more I'd run off just to spite him for being so damn clever or practical or whatever you want to call it when you recruit your only child to the family business."

"The Family Business is war?"

"Has been for five centuries," he confirmed, "Prozen family's been fighting since the Zeppelin's came to the throne. Like it that way and we're good at it. We beat the Schubaltz clan out of a Dukedom and a Ministerial title so now they're just Earls or Generals. The name's all over the academy walls in Guylos and at Vashguard. Not that I think I'll ever make an impact at Vashguar- Why am I telling a dip like you this? Do you even known how peerage works?"

"Peer what?" Van blinked. "Um, no, but you should keep telling me stuff. Makes me think you're mildly normal when no one's looking."

"Versus you who is_ painfully_ normal?"

"Painfully _fantastic_ you mean."

Eyes were rolled at that.

* * *

><p>is the continent Prozen refers to in the Red River episodes and the central continent of Zi if you go off the Manga<p>

2. I pick on the Republic a lot but frankly so does everyone else in the series. The place is damn near bankrupt if their track record is anything to go off and the Empire's rather known for their higher-than-thou attitude towards the _'Rebels'_. (Given too that Prozen still calls them '_Rebels_' when even Marcus calls them the '_Republic'_ I'd say he's probably fairly traditional on that so I think it's safe to assume so is Raven especially after that spiel he gives Karl.)

3. Mentioned Hiltz and Reece here. I'm taking a few liberties with Hiltz' age in this one (given some theories I play with about when and where exactly Raven's parents bit the dust). So Raven has quite the shared history before we hit season two (give they never bother to introduce themselves to him in season 2 I can guess he already knows them anyway in the canon pretty readily).

4. 'Charlene' is the trashiest Australian name I can think of right after 'Shelia'. Just picture yourself saying it with a really bad Aussie accent and you'll get a good sense of Van's Great Grandmother. (We're not all called Shelia or Charlene down here mercifully.)

Okay guys hope you're having a good one and I got a giggle out of you. Chapter 3 is a little while off now University is kicking up but drop me a line if you like. Criticism is always welcome. Hope Jamies enjoyed as always and I'm currently working on a (much larger) Zoids fic for later in the year draft so keep your eyes open!


	3. In which Van suspects Raven might have a

AN: Hey lovelies, hope some of you are back again, this is where things pick up a little (including some typical boy romance fodder so warnings: danger! Danger Will Robinson!). Hope you enjoy. Jamies I very much hope you enjoy especially.

* * *

><p>Chapter 3: <em>In which Van suspects Raven might have a brain tumor<em>.

Raven's head bobbed a little across the cave as he shuffled on the stone. Van tried shouting louder but the other insistently ignored him. The headphones Raven had stuffed in his ears came after a rather bad few hours involving general cleanliness and a bathroom trip that would _never_ be mentioned again. Now the Imperial was sick of being kind, Van had used up his sympathy supply for the day well before noon, and was pretending the other boy didn't exist as he worked on…something. Van couldn't see what and the other wouldn't tell him. Van assumed it was plans relating to whatever the Imperial Army did when they weren't harassing other nations.

He was accustomed to being ignored for his irritability factor but Raven was already rather pro at shutting Van out. Normally you needed to share genes with him to be this efficient at it. Even Irvine and Moonbay had to resort to smacking Van round the head occasionally because he wouldn't shut up but darn it he was bored. Was it really so unreasonable to want to do something to help himself get out of here? He hated being dependent on the other young man and Raven obviously despised it. Van was very, very, bad at just sitting still and healing.

Van was only half aware of how crazy with worry his friends were going on the other side of this particular patch of desert but he'd be quite flattered by it later.

* * *

><p>Raven was well aware conversely of how Marcus would be losing his shit right about…now actually. He shrugged it off. Marcus' panic attacks weren't his problem. If the jack ass wanted a <em>'stress less'<em> kind of career he shouldn't have joined the military. As for Marcus' ambitious streak, his need to perform well under the watchful eyes of the men back home, well that wasn't Raven's problem either. The day Marcus got a general's stripe Raven would resort to under aged alcoholism. The only part of Marcus' panic that interested him at all was how exactly the commander was going to explain to his biggest competitor Schubaltz and Minister Prozen, Raven's guardian, that the kid was MIA. He had to snigger at that. He wanted to be a fly on the wall for that conversation.

His stomach sagged suddenly however. He couldn't stay out here long without someone being sent to find him. If it wasn't goody two-shoes Schubaltz with his big brother complex (Raven vaguely remembered the career soldier had a brother about his age) then it would probably be the nearest Knight. He did_ not_ want one of them coming to drag him home in disgrace. He did _not_ want Hanna or Kirche or Moura or Hardin seeing Van. He could dodge treason accusations all day long but there was something so…embarrassing about recklessly and needlessly helping this punk.

The idea was almost frightening. He could get in trouble for this. Not so much the whole _compassionate rescue_ thing but dodging his responsibilities in the campaign certainly. This was definitely a break in protocol even if the Knights were independent of the normal chain of command (without which they'd _all_ be breaking protocol frequently). He was sticking his neck out by throwing everything up in the air and running off like this for no damn good reason at all (cause Van definitely wouldn't count as a good reason to anyone up top). He sighed. He was going to have to do something about this.

"Yo ugly," Raven called popping an earphone out as he stood to stride out of the cave briskly with his backpack over one shoulder, "don't wreck anything while I'm gone. You're on your own for a while!"

Van flustered at that scrambling up as much as he could but too pinned down by injury to follow.

"Where the heck are you going?" He hollered.

"Like I keep saying- none of goddam your business," Raven answered curtly. "Stay here Shadow."

The Organoid and Raven's patient both cringed at that. He had the sense neither of them very much liked the idea of being stuck together.

"Bring back something edible!" Van ordered.

"You've got limbs to chew off if you get hungry!" He reminded the other young man dismissively as he departed.

He had to sit himself on a rusting Moulga corpse, in the mass of horde remains from Van's battle, to get enough reception on the radio to make a call. He tugged his cloak from his bag and pulled it over his head as he settled on the burning steel under the desert sun and fumbled with the controls deftly. Chad in communications got him first, nice guy Chad, knew some things about hot wiring guys a respectable man probably shouldn't have, and was keen to drive home Raven's own concerns.

"Losing their shit over you here," Chad declared brazenly, "you should stay gone longer. I wanna see Marcus bust a vein."

"Intend to." Raven assured him. "Get me the nasty little ass kisser while you're at it and I'll give you a show."

"I'll be tuning in for sure." The communications officer swore jovially as he put Raven to hold while he wrangled with the primitive circuit board controlling the sectors' military communications for the campaign.

"Raven!" Marcus cried mere seconds later. "Where are you?"

"Siesta." He joked idly freeing a bit of dirt from under his nails with his incisors. "I'll be back in a couple days. You and Schubaltz head on and I'll meet you at Osa."

"Order's from HQ-"

"Say to follow the pace of my attacks," Raven reminded more than a little smug, "and I'm saying go on ahead. I cleared all the Sleepers. All you have to do is take the main force up to the Gougalas facility. Why? Can't you handle it? You want me to take care of the Gougalas for you as well so you can sit on your ass some more? Guess after you fell for Kruger's ambush you're cautious, whatever, thrashing the Gougalas will look great on my record. I might get a medal…"

"Fine then!" Marcus snapped and Raven knew he had him cornered. "If you're going to be belligerently you can meet us at Osa! I'll take the damn Gougalas myself! I certainly don't need any help from a punk like you."

"Go for it." Raven dismissed. He knew Marcus wouldn't miss out on the chance for glory when it was dangled so sweetly. No wonder Prozen had this guy eating out of his hand. This was painfully, transparently, easy. "You do know what an ambush is now right? Just before I let you run off and make a mess of everything again."

"You'll be lucky if I don't have you court marshaled for this!" The officer swore reverently. "Don't expect me to put in a good word for you with the Minister either! Good day!"

"Cheerio then," Raven chortled as the opposing receiver was slammed against the console back in HQ, "you get that Chad?"

"Made my day." The cheeky little eavesdropper assured him. "Catch ya later kiddo."

"Bye."

Raven reclined on his palms with an uneasy exhale. He'd bought himself some time to dally and Van to heal. It bothered him to no end that subconscious or not, for some reason or another, he cared about the welfare of another human being. He tried again not to think about it. It was the simplest solution just not to question why he gave a damn.

The next problem would be getting Van as far away from his as possible and soon too because he couldn't hold off the call to arms forever. The sooner the Republican was back with his friends and the natural order of the universe was restored the better. Though… it was a very fanciful idea and it lasted all of a second but for just that tiny morsel of time Raven considered trying to sway Van over…Least then he'd have something to show for all this…

Nope. No. Not going to happen. That was monumentally bad thinking and Raven squashed it. So that left what? '_Always have a Plan B_' was a Prozen Family staple (and it was usually called '_Plan B_' for '_Blow that Fucker Up. Problem Solved._') and Raven only took a second to work on his. He cast a wary eye over the messy horde graveyard and spotted the Shield Liger plainly in the distance. If he could just get the radio on the damn thing working Van could disappear for good and he could start being normal again. There were plenty of parts just lying about it occurred to him and he was nothing if not tech savy.

Looked like he'd be playing Dr Frankenstien with the Zoids for a while…

* * *

><p>"You were gone for hours!" Van whined. "What'd you do run into an angry mob of villagers looking for a witch to burn?"<p>

Raven raised the bag in his grasp a little higher, shaking it as it dangled, one hand on his hip as the plastic rustled. Van's eyes widened considerably at that and his hands came together in a sincere prayer gesture, casting his eyes up and mumbling to himself as Raven strode closer.

"I shouldn't give you any of this." Raven taunted. "I should just eat it all in front of you outside hopping reach."

"No, don't do that," Van insisted, "that'd be totally kind and charitable and all that stuff. Cause, ya know, I hate food. Shucks if you really want to torment me you should make me eat it. That'd just…Oh that'd suck."

"Pfft, I bet," he snorted, "you made me fucking hungry with that hamburger rant."

"They're God's gift the masses."

"Soul of the Vox Populi eh?"

"The pox what-uli?" Van blinked. He waved his hand dismissively and reach out with grabby toddler hands to appeal to Raven for sustenance. "Whatever. Seriously I don't care if it's frozen tuna casserole. I'll take it."

"Not quite. We don't even allow that shit in Hell."

"Knew it," Van nodded approvingly, "so telling my sister that. So what ya get?"

"Food of champions." Raven shrugged. He was tempted to toss Van the bag but he suspected the Republican might rifle through its contents like a hungry piranha and leave him with nothing. He was not a raven who scavenged. He had a wallet to take care of that. Instead he held each item up for Van's brief inspection. "Honey, milk, bread, chocolate and strawberries."

"Everything you need to set up for a bad porno," Van laughed, "looks good. All of that's sweeter than you. Share?"

"Excuse me?" He didn't know if he should retaliate at the insult or the blatant reference to pornography. "What do you know about porn?"

"What don't I know?" Van laughed lightly, it was so flippant and jovial Raven found himself blinking, "they don't baby you out in the Wind Colony that's for sure. We don't get any actual porn mind, cause that'd take a TV and we're lucky to have a generator, but you can get married at fifteen and most of the girls are knocked up by twelve. All the dirty magazines in town are from like the fifties though…"

"Geeze!" Raven reeled back. That was an entirely foreign concept to him. In the upper circles of the Empire they still used terms like '_affianced_' and had eighteen month engagements. "Don't they teach you punks anything about sex ed?"

"Only got one church school in town," Van shrugged, "only went up to the eighth grade. If you want more than that in the desert you've got to join the army. The Republican Army has bridging courses that you have to take."

"No wonder we're trying to civilize you natives with canon fire."

"Hey!" The other blanched. "It's not all that bad! There's lots of good hard working folk in the Republic."

"Ahuh," Raven dismissed, "the restless natives want food or a political debate?"

"Food." The answer was so immediate Van obviously had no doubt in his head where his loyalties lay and apparently that was solely to his stomach.

What occurred next was such a rare astrological event Van was sure it would be discussed in classrooms everywhere for centuries to come: Raven and Van shared. You couldn't get much more incredible than that really. Van shuffled to give Raven some of the sleeping bag to sit on, Raven dumped the bags and much finger-food was dispersed for a messy brunch. Van, with his hand in the honey, felt kind of like a cartoon bear and Raven blew him off with an roll of the eyes as he stuffed bits of strawberries and chocolate between to chunks of bread.

"What's that?" Van chortled.

"We call it a sandwich in the civilized world." Raven scoffed chewing complacently.

"Looks more like a dessert." He was unconvinced about how delightful that combination could possibly taste but Raven seemed to enjoy it so peacefully Van found himself cracking off a piece of chocolate for his own then coughing. "Ew! Yuck!"

"Seventy percent cocoa." Raven remarked as though he'd meant to warn Van but had forgotten and didn't really care. "Dark chocolate."

"That's gross."

"Posh." The Imperial corrected. Preparing another little '_sandwich_' for himself. "I'll stick it in my coffee later with some milk and we'll see how much you dislike it then."

"Your taste buds are broken." Van dismissed dipping hunks of bread into the honey, one of which Raven stole plucking it right out of his hands unceremoniously, and unscrewing the milk to help himself. "Definitely need papaya."

"That stuff's disgusting. Tastes like soap."

"Oh now I know you're nuts." Van tsked.

* * *

><p>Zeke was still out when the sun set. After twenty-four hours Van was more than a little concerned for the fate of his Organoid. They were tough little troopers Organoids, especially Zeke when Van put him through the ringer frequently, but they had a limit. If Zeke had hit his remained to be seen.<p>

"If it was dead it'd be stoning up," Raven's comment was completely unprompted and Van supposed the chocolate-coffee concoction he was sipping has put him in a more reasonably sympathetic mood, "he'll be right."

"Yeah but…" Van sighed, hands worrying the back of his neck slipping only as he glanced back over his shoulder every few moments, "still…"

Raven snorted. His comforting only extended so far. Shadow stood over Zeke, sniffing, interested by Van's own curiosity to suppose the Organoid might be about to do something interesting. His long head twitched towards Raven with a little rumble and the Imperial gave a lazy, curt, nod.

Shadow promptly kicked Zeke in the head.

"Oi!" Van squawked.

Shadow's optics twitched to the Republican, leaning back on his haunches, as though very affronted. Van swiped his arm through the air ordering the black Organoid to shoo wordlessly and with a stubborn little huff Shadow gave Zeke another firm_ thwack_ with his tail.

"Nasty bugger." Van mumbled watching Zeke for any signs of life after the brief beating.

"They're mostly like that." Raven informed him. "Yours is just retarded."

"He ain't retarded. Zeke's just friendly."

"And I'm just a repressed charity case."

"Sounds bout right," Van didn't miss a beat on that one, grinning, and Raven supposed the little bitch was getting sharper. So he flashed him the bird and, annoyingly, Van laughed boisterously.

"It's no fun when you don't get riled up or offended." Raven sighed.

"I'll work on that."

"What about booze in the Republic?" The question was rather sudden and Van blinked suspiciously as Raven prompted it. "What's the drinking age?"

"Eighteen," Van recounted, "but most everyone's had something by the time they're twelve where I come from."

"Where's that exactly? Sounds like the ass end of nowhere." Raven held his mug a little higher after plunking another piece of chocolate in the steaming liquid.

"Pretty much." He shrugged. "They let you drink?"

"Not officially," Raven waved his hand in a so-so motion as he elaborated, "used to slip me stuff when I was little cause I wouldn't sleep. I used to think it was just really good hot chocolate-" Van laughed "-turns out it was the vodka. So by the time I was old enough to start asking for sips of Baileys Prozen didn't think it mattered."

"My sister used to slip me rum makes _really_ boozy Apple Pie."

"Alcohol: mummy's little helper all over Zi." Raven snorted.

"Hah," Van gave an odd little sigh and the grin on his face would've been damn near infectious to a sweeter set of human being, "you know that's got to be the first time you've started a conversation!"

"So?" Raven frowned, he had an odd sensation of being trapped and mildly contemptuous.

"Well it's just nice is all," Van shrugged fumbling the back of his neck, "you didn't insult me or anything and hey turns out we've got plenty in common this past day or so right?"

Van watched expected a snappy reply for his kind revelation of camaraderie but instead he was privy to the strangest look passing over Raven's face. The Imperial boy paled a shade, as though Van had suggested something very dirty that involved tumbling in a hay loft, and his eyes darted with something of a queasy nature.

"Hey now," Van quirked his hand extending to almost touch brush other boy's knuckle, "you okay?"

"Fuck." Raven hissed bolting up from the ground to stomp from Van's reach without so much as a note of sass.

Raven game a fuming little groan, half a scream, like he might tear his hair out and Van watched, frozen, as he stomped clear out of view into the night with a dumbfounded expression plastered stupidly across his features. He realized a moment or so later, after waiting for Raven to return, that his hand was still out stretched and lowered it in a slump. Van sighed blowing a tuft of hair out of his face and sprawled back in submission.

"Whatever," he groaned, "I so don't get that guy…"

He lay there, regarding the mottled arch of the cave, as Shadow rose and trailed after Raven. The Organoid seemed to decide if Van wasn't going after the boy he had better follow.

Van didn't mind so much the big black monstrosity was hardly as good fun as Zeke though Van had managed to draw his attention with a puppet show or two today during the hours they waited for Raven to return. Shadow hadn't gotten quite as excited as Zeke would've but his head and risen from the stone and he'd followed the little darting blobs keenly. The Organoid had even given Van a good sniffing over at one point to comprehend how Van was responsible for the illusion to which Van had declared himself the '_Shadow Puppet King_' and the Organoid had snorted.

"_Bugger off!_" The scream was half hoarse and the rattle of tin on steel told Van Shadow has just gotten a mug to the face. He cringed. Whatever he'd said to piss Raven off he'd done a good job of it…

* * *

><p>Eventually, very eventually, Raven finished his tantrum and slunk back inside. By this point Van had finished the honey and he kind of hoped the other boy wouldn't notice. Luck was on his side for this because with a little huff of air Raven nudged him with his booted foot.<p>

"Shuffle." He ordered blandly refusing to make eye contact.

"Are you embarrassed?" Van guessed awed.

"_Move over_." Raven spat.

Van's hands flew up in defense and he shifted his sorry as across the over-used, sorry looking, sleeping bag. This whole thing was starting to feel like a bad sleep over actually…Not the fun Rumble-In-The-Barn type either. Raven unzipped the poor thing, dancing about Van's cautious form and unfolded it.

"Shadow." He waved plopping down next the stiff, cautious, Republican.

The Organoid groaned, twisting up from its sprawled position to go rummage in the cockpit of the Zabre and return with a thick blanket it tossed into Raven's expectant hands.

"We have to share." The imperial informed him blandly unfolding the fabric. "I'm not sleeping in the cockpit again it gives me back pain."

"Totally cool." Van consented. "I snore though, just warning, kay?"

"_Yeah_." Raven scoffed. "We know."

He decided it was probably a bad idea to tell Raven he rolled around like an aspiring contortionist as well… He'd find out soon enough and Van would probably know, from the suddenly physical violence that would be used in retaliation, exactly when that was.

* * *

><p>Van, surprisingly, didn't wake to any physical violence. He did wake up twice but neither time involved a concussion of any sort mercifully. Really it was kind of odd sleeping with another person so close by. Van had only done it a few times in his short life: after afternoons in the <em>infamous<em> Wind Colony hay loft, when he was little after a nightmare, and when he and Fiona had fallen asleep in the back of the Gustav (which happened more often than you'd expect).

The first time he woke during the night it was from discomfort. He was cramped and seriously sore. Sure he tended to take tossing-and-turning to a new extreme but, hey, whatever made a guy comfy right? He squirmed a little, yawning, and let his eyes flutter languidly in the darkness. The first thing he noticed was that he was sleeping on his back like a normal human being for the first time ever. The second thing he noticed was that Raven was forcing that upon him by pinning his sorry ass to the sleeping bag.

Raven wasn't actually pinning him mind you. There was no Imperial nut job sitting on him with a surgical needle in his hand this time but there was a sleeping kid half on top of him. Raven had thrown one arm over his chest and hiked a leg over him effectively trapping him in place. He glanced down, exhaling pointedly into Raven's face to dislodge some of his hair, and really Raven was surprisingly cute looking when he was unconscious. Definitely did wonders for his face when he wasn't sneering or frowning or questioning the relations of his parents… He considered moving but he suspected that would either inflame his injuries or wake up the sleeping psycho currently using him as a teddy bear.

Nah, he could be a teddy bear just this once.

The second time he woke up wasn't anywhere near as nice for his ego or his ear drums. It all happened at once: Raven flailed, snapping up like a vampire in a coffin, and then made a gut wrenching cry between a sob and a scream. Then he actually started sobbing, hysterically, and Van rushed to prop himself up.

"Woah! What?_ What?_" Van pried grasping the boy's heaving shoulders to try and still him. "What happened?"

Raven didn't answer, Van guessed he was too far gone in his own hysterics to pay any attention to the Republican, and awkwardly he tugged the boy closer. He was nervous Raven might strike out but instead he let Van hook one arm around him and squeeze him tight.

"Hey, it's right," Van soothed hopelessly, "you're alright. What happened?"

Nothing. Raven only twisted in his arms and grasped Van back. His hands hooked up round Van's sides to dig his fingers into the Republican's back, between his shoulder blades, nails twisting in Van's shirt and forcing most of the air out of him. Raven squeezed Van back so hard Van was forced to tighten his own arms in response round the Imperial, in hopes of calming him down as he continued to sob into Van's neck, till his forearms ached.

He had no idea what was going on exactly so Van did what Maria always did: he ran his hand up and down Raven's back, rocking them slightly, keeping his arms as tight as possible even as Raven's grip loosened. Van had this funny feeling like he'd fallen down a rabbit hole into a strange parallel universe where up was down, the world ran on totally foreign logic and it was mostly painful. He guessed it had happened when the horde knocked him out in battle, well before Raven's latest breakdown, because since he'd woken up in the cave this was pretty mundane as far as normalcy. Maybe he was in limbo? That'd be so cool.

Raven sniffed, his head stubbornly buried against Van's neck and chest, and Van had this stick, damp, feeling from the tears that was kind of itchy. In the lull, the quiet, Van made the wise decision to keep his mouth shut and lay back slowly. Raven shifted and let him drag the Imperial down with him back into much the same position they'd been tangled in earlier in the evening. Raven was listless and Van silent. It was painfully tenuous for the Republican but all those hysterics seemed to have exhausted the other boy because his breathing started to ease even if his grip on Van tightened.

Was this what it was like to sleep on a live mine?

* * *

><p>Blood, lots of blood, bent back limbs, contorted spines, a ruined laboratory and a very angry monster who had come out of nowhere and would come back for him.<p>

Raven hadn't had that particular dream for what felt like a century. It had been such a long time ago that the dream and all the memories surrounding it had faded from his lazy recollection like childhood memories often tend to do. They'd gone wandering or to sleep but hadn't faded entirely it seemed. The last time those images had been clear to him he'd been tiny and a totally different man had bundled him up and chased them away without every getting a proper explanation from Raven.

When he was little he'd been so fucking terrified about speaking a word concerning the nightmares, so irrational, so convinced, but school, birthdays, the formalities of a new life and growing up had suppressed all of that once the initial paranoia faded. Once he realized said monster wasn't coming back, probably couldn't reach him in the cradle of one of the most powerful men on the planet and probably couldn't do much harm now Raven knew how to fight well…all the intensity vanished under more pressing memories.

Really it had been so long since he'd had that dream that Raven couldn't remember anything surrounding it anymore. Who had the monster killed again? Why had he been there? How had Prozen found him? The entire timeline was muddled up in his head behind a thick mental block. His memories didn't stretch back any farther than the death of Prince Rudolf's father and everything bar the nightmare was blackness and obscurity. He knew he hadn't always been in Prozen's care, or in the Capital, but that was all he remembered at all.

It wouldn't be till years later, when Reese cracked the mental lock with the aid of few particularly nasty Zoids, that Raven would shift his deeply set amnesia. Till then nothing else sat in his head but that nightmare and it played at him dreadfully the next morning when he woke. He lay against Van, really too embarrassed to move and wake the snoring Republican, watching the sun trickle in between Van's jaw and chest to his little window of vision.

Why have it now? After all these years? Why with Van here? He strained and he felt very much like it was trying to read something he'd burnt years ago. There was nothing. Except…maybe… a man's face? It mingled with two or three others in a fuzzy merger but he caught glimpses of it. No, it was Van's face, that was all. As he'd never met the Republican before recently he assumed that the face he half saw was just a silly delusion. Maybe when he was tiny he'd known someone with Van's cheekbones or his eyes or something every day and commonplace.

He shuffled fractionally half up onto his elbow to regard Van's unconscious body. He didn't look over him like a fish this time. Actually he found himself a little bit more sympathetic. The brat had been kind to him last night, he remembered that much, Van was probably one of only two or three people to ever see him cry properly now and one of only two to ever make an effort to comfort him…

Darn, now he really owed the little shit. Raven didn't like owing people, not one bit, his subconscious had a nasty habit of leeching onto anyone who provided for him with a stupid kind of devotion. He was getting a surge of that now, like bile in his throat, and it was difficult to suppress.

As he sat up rubbing at his aching shoulder which had been jammed under Van's arm he played with the idea of getting a few more hours in fixing the Liger. The thing was ugly right now, Raven had made more of a mess than he'd actually fixed thus far so now he had to put all the pieces back in the box of the console and hope it worked. It would, definitely, Raven was competent with machines. He was no Schubaltz family Vashguard grade genius but his family always came through on the_ practicalities_ of getting shit done. He could fix anything even if he couldn't necessarily make it pretty and swish and he could fix it fast. Contrary to popular belief the Knights were not as concerned with aesthetics as you'd think.

He glanced down at Van again. The thick sun-soaked tan stuck to his hide was rather appealing when you cast it under natural light. Van's hair was a fairly dark shade of brown, like his eyes actually, but that Raven found he liked better than the chocolate dumbasses with their bleach blonde hair. Though the dark hair and the dark skin really did achieve a sort of…native look that against Raven's blotchy pale Imperialism was all the more foreign. Van's whole body was perfectly untouched by chemical alteration of any sort, no interference from hair dyes or ointments or moisturizers or anything that wasn't natural, which Raven supposed was half a metaphor and rather suited him too. Van obviously had enough innocent self-confidence not to care about his appearance or not to be lulled into some feeling of inadequacy because he wasn't X, Y or Z (which were often entirely fabricated, impossible or interchangeable in Raven's experience).

Raven liked confidence. All the important men in his life were nasty buggers, often with a-typical appearances, who didn't give a damn what everyone else thought and carried themselves well. He'd been taught to like that. Van wasn't anywhere near as graceful but he looked warm, approachable, and he carried what few benefits genetics had afforded him well. Raven had an inkling that, like most Republicans, Van would fill out and be rather stout, broad and strong when he got a little older and lost the baby fat. All the better to make village girls swoon. Hell, it half made Raven want to recite '_My Jolly Sailor Gay_'.

He dragged his teeth over his lower lip thoughtfully. Really Raven didn't have much in way of personality to recommend him but he had good genes. What Van would lack in good genes he'd make up for in personality. That charming nice-guy spiel seemed to make most girls forget your rather lacking fashion choices and minor physical short comings apparently. Van would be decidedly manlier than he would be for sure. He was already nearly bigger than him. Raven supposed he didn't care, he'd never much favored traditional masculinity as it existed in the Republic (because Van was a damn good example of that) because the Empire's men tended to be more effeminate as a rule of culture, but something about Van made strict by-the-by comparison somehow essential and competitive.

For a very long moment he found himself perplexed by the definition of Van's cheek bone above the doughy cheek and the expanse of his forehead. He tilted his head this way, then that, it was a funny consideration and he wasn't sure what he was considering before he'd already done it.

Remembering Raven's tongue was so incredibly venomous his lips were probably the sweetest and most misleading feature of his face. Van's cheek conversely was very soft and not at all misleading considering how often it conspired with his mouth to form a smile. Raven wasn't sure why he kissed him there, or then on the cheekbone, or then on the forehead and then why he, almost hungrily, caught Van's lips briefly.

Then Raven pulled back, heart a little fast, gathered himself up onto his feet and wandered off briskly to get dressed and go attend to the liger. Shadow said nothing, Shadow knew well enough not to so much as _think _anything on the matter he'd just observed with Raven anywhere nearby, but he got up and he followed Raven very diligently when the Imperial boy made it out of the cave.

Left by his lonesome, after Raven's footsteps had long since faded, Van very cautiously opened one suspicious eye. Assured he was alone the Republican floundered up, still somewhat in shock, on two accounts: firstly that he had been so convincing in his fake sleep and secondly because that couldn't have just happened. Van had almost caused a fuss when Raven kissed his cheek, which he was sure would've sent the Imperial flying back in denial, but Van had only realized what was happening when those lips returned to his face.

He felt his lips curiously. They felt rather cracked and sore to him but whether they had to Raven he wasn't sure. He'd lain there from when the Imperial started stirring hoping to make the morning routine as un-awkward as possible when all this had started. For a nasty creature Raven gave fairly charming kisses…

Truth be told Van had gallivanted around the hay-loft often enough to know his way round a kiss and a few other things (with the help of the guys and gals at home) but most of the other kids at the Wind Colony tended to be much more forward and use quite a bit of tongue. Van didn't think he'd ever been kissed like that, gotten someone's sent in his nose like that, felt a girl or a boy lean tense and slender over him like that in a way that was teasing and riled his anticipation massively. That was just cruel and Van had been much to stumped a second ago to grab Raven…

Gosh darn it there was no way he could bring it up without Raven hitting him for playing dead and if he brought up last night or the hug, ever in his mortal life, he was pretty sure Raven would slaughter him where he stood. He groaned digging his hands in his hair and throwing himself back down. Guy was going to be the death of him!

* * *

><p>1. Chad is entirely fictional but I love him. We all know a Chad.<br>2. I imagine Raven/Van's childhood based on a combination of things; the Aussie relationship with Brits, old western flicks, classic literature, surviving 12yrs of catholic education…So yeah, I might perceive Raven as somewhat of a prude and Van as somewhat of a perv but that was just how it worked in my old hometown. Sides, what teenage boy isn't interested in sex? I was a girl and _I_ was fascinated.  
>3. As for the whole Imperial effeminateRepublic manly thing… email me if you want more details the explanatory rant is too long.  
>4. Yes the, ahem, '<em>lovin<em>' started this chapter so now's the time to run if you need to.

Anyway I hope you guys enjoyed, even just a little, I didn't get long to edit this chapter unfortunately so my apologies. If you spot anything really off somewhere just let me know and I'll make a note to fix it up!


	4. In which things get incredibly messy on

AN: Hey there lovelies. There's payoff here and the start of real trouble but hey you know what they say- it always gets worse before it gets better. I'm taking that to heart here so don't despair there should be a happy ending but warnings of some shipping here.

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><p>Chapter 4: <em>In which things get incredibly messy on all sides.<em>

The Shield Liger was a stubborn, confounding, piece of machinery. The mass was so bluntly constructed Raven wondered if he'd stumbled onto baby's-first-engineering course. High performance it might've been but the Republic had wasted no time stylizing the Zoid. It was all durability and endurance. Big enough and fat enough to run head on into opposing forces sure but obviously no money had been left over in the budget for niceties.

Annoyingly the Zoid itself could be quickly remedied by an Organoid. Not much of the damage was beyond cosmetic but Shadow refused to touch the damn thing because apparently stepping inside another Organoid's mojo was disgusting. Raven didn't outright blame the Organoid for that standard but the radio and some of the more delicate cockpit systems had been thrown to shit when the canopy collapsed and were giving him trouble. Van wasn't exactly a cleanly sort of chap either considering all the crap he'd left in the cockpit. When was the last time he'd had this mess detailed? Raven was damn sure there was a rotting ham sandwich lodged somewhere because he could smell it to an intensity bordering taste. All and all working conditions weren't the best so packing it up for the morning he left the machine.

Schubaltz and Marcus were heading to Osa today through the wreckage of the Chronos fortress and there were thick clouds amassing beyond the desert visible along the horizon if only because it was so vast and empty otherwise. Raven was jealous. He wanted to be there. He had been sincerely looking forward to being the first of the Knights to combat the Republic's latest innovation the Gougalas. Now someone else would snap up that pleasure when Prozen stormed New Helics with the main force. If Raven wanted to make that battle he'd have to leave in a few days or so…

He had his certainties that the rain would linger over Marcus' unit and give them trouble rather than swinging back round this way so he left the open cockpit unsheltered and gathered up his things to head back.

He considered raiding the nearby village again. The settlement had been abandoned by fleeing Republicans and then squatted in by Marcus' recently departed unit. Finding food yesterday had been relatively simple but he found he wasn't in much of a mood for the pleasures of a proper meal. He wasn't in much of a mood for anything today. Honestly he wanted to be curled up on the couch back home with a bowl of reheated bolognaise and a bad rerun. He wanted his slacks, his hoodie, he wanted that kind of Saturday morning when Prozen couldn't be assed to do dishes all day. This whole campaign was beginning to drag something chronic.

* * *

><p>Van was way more excited to see Raven than he should've been all things considered. Raven put it down to his improving health because being able to stand again did wonders for Van's ADHD prone disposition. He was very proud of his upright position when Raven came back and found the Imperial's complete lack of surprise thoroughly disappointing.<p>

"Bout freaking time you made it back up," Raven goaded lazily plopping himself down to finally receive the first coffee of the day, "no more hopping around like a dipshit."

"Oi! I was an _amazing_ hopper," Van declared as he watched, he was so pleased with himself Raven could tell the punk would stay on his feet as long as he could manage to get away with. "I'm thinking I'm good enough to hover-board even. I can go check out the Liger and call the gang!"

"Two problems," Raven gesticulated with his index and pointer finger raised, "one we don't have any hover-boards-" Van seemed quite aghast at this "-and two your radio's broken."

"It is?" He mumbled good hand worrying the back of his neck in that most annoyingly goodie-two-shoes gesture again. "Darn… I don't know how to fix that…"

"Working on it." The other admitted distantly.

"Really?"

"Anything to get rid of you." Raven scoffed raising the coffee to his lips all while fumbling in his bag for the last of the chocolate.

"Nah you love me," Van joked idly though the undertone of suspicion and knowing that passed between them was damn near unavoidable even if it wasn't spoken of, "you think it'll take long to set it straight? At this rate Irvine's gonna run off and leave me for dead I bet!"

"Little bit longer unless your useless Organoid drags it's ass up." Raven rued.

"He twitched a little this morning," the Republican sounded so blissfully certain Raven was damn assured whatever Van constituted as a twitch had probably been a pathetically mild show of life, "I think he's getting better."

"Well if one little fight knocked him out of order for good he'd be a monumentally cheap Organoid." He insisted nastily. "Not that it would surprise me given how much of a dumbass that thing is."

"Just because you have the douche-bag king of Organoids," Van quipped, and Shadow gave an irritable little hiss clucking his teeth towards the boy.

"You've never meet a female," Raven answered simply, "or a bull male. They're all douche-bag machines, every Organoid except yours which is obviously some failed attempt at inbreeding, much like yourself."

"Ouch," Van hooted mildly, "you out of virgin blood this morning?"

"With you around? Never."

"Who says I'm a virgin?"

"Oh lord," Raven cringed at Van's smug little grin, "you are filthy aren't you?"

"Nah not that filthy really," the Republican admitted finally, "no notches of this bedpost yet. Dad was real traditional bout being loyal to just one girl like that. Sure ya can mess around but the real stuff you save. So I'm saving the real stuff."

"Oh and won't she be a lucky girl," the Imperial snorted, "to get the whole Van package."

"Ladies everywhere will cry with envy-"

"More like gratitude." Raven sneered cradling his chin in one hand.

"What about you?" Van pried exasperated but still stubbornly lodged in a vein of good humor.

"Why on Zi would I tell you?"

"Well then tell me about Organoids." Van ordered. "I've only ever had Zeke. Who else has em? Where do they come from? What are the girl one's like?"

"That's top secret." Raven diminished instantly.

"So you can hint at it but you won't tell me anything?"

"Not a smidgen." He certified confidently.

"Then round again we go," Van prodded, "how many girls have you kissed?"

"That's a pretty radical shift." He twitched.

"You won't tell me bout Organoids and I figure your sexual prowess ain't exactly top secret."

"Some of the upper brass would argue otherwise." Raven snorted. Most of the adults in his life would have a hernia if he did anything to '_shame_' himself at such, what the Empire considered anyway, a young age.

Apparently what was young in the Empire was radically different in the Republic however. Not many Imperial kids had farms to run whereas, likewise, not many Republican kids obviously had school to attend. In the Empire it was mandatory but in a vast, almost unconnected, primarily agricultural and desert territory ruled by a debt stricken government the Republic hadn't yet had the momentum to shift any educational policies. Besides that they needed food and soldiers. So school took a back seat to farming and marriage ages were deliriously low. It wasn't much different in the Empire but where the Republic married '_in foal'_ for mainly romanticized reasons and democratic good for all the Empire married their children for politics. Prozen had weaseled out of such a marriage only with Zeppelin's selfish backing and Raven was, he knew, a commodity to be bartered over.

He wasn't sure where to begin explaining to someone like Van, who came from such a radically different culture, the capital gain and social stigma that went into the whole complex proceeding of Imperial Courtship. Hell even homosexual relations were perpetuated for _Patron Politics_ as Hiltz put it. In the capital and in the old, noble, families (right where Raven sat) this kind of nonsense was still viciously dominant. Still he made a foolish attempt to start with the basic need-to-know shit.

"Kids fool around in Capital," Raven shrugged, "but if anyone ever found out I'd so much as fondled somebody it'd be over some newspaper and I'd be disgraced. You're not supposed to do that kind of junk outside of marriage. Last girl who had a live in boyfriend got booted from the Senate and ran back to Porto. The gossip was nasty when everyone found out."

"That is so stupid." Van huffed. "We can't live without our gossip. Sides how else are you supposed to learn about how any of that works?"

"Well we're literate." Raven retorted snappily.

"I heard you guys were all homophobes," the Republican supposed, "cause of the church."

"I heard the same about you lot," the Imperial blanked, "they say you're all bible thumpers who take it literally."

"No way!" Van laughed. "We'll try anything once! Dude's considered a pussy if he's too stiff to kiss another guy."

"The upper brass love their man-boy love." Raven scoffed with a chuckle. "There's this whole perpetuated myth that women are all jealous and fickle and real, simple, love can only happen between two men."

"We dig it." The Republican concurred before adding rather bluntly: "Lesbians are hot."

"Ditto."

They actually fell into laughing. Raven wondered for a moment how much exactly had been lost in translation over the border but in an extremist family sect that was fairly dangerous thinking. How many Republican kids thought stupid nonsense about their Imperial counterparts because there weren't any field trips to visit their neighbors and find out?

There was a dreadful scraping sound beyond their position, just near the Zabre, of metal on stone. The pair of them cringed, shaken out of the thought, and Shadow fell into a brutal procession of hissing groans his tail flickering suddenly to life. Van twitched and stumbled half off his feet past Raven and round the Organoid as Shadow fell into a crouch, to attempt a pounce, his big black rump swinging like a cat.

"Down Shadow," Raven snapped, slipping from his thighs up to follow the Republican in thoughtless curiosity as Van disappeared behind the leg of the Zoid. "What is it now?"

Van had fallen to his knees beside Zeke and the silver Organoid was whimpering weakly up at him through reignited optics.

"Oh thank goodness!" Van blubbered and Raven was certain the boy was about to start crying the way he fell over the Organoid and gathered up its neck in his arms. "You're okay buddy!"

"Lord," Raven sighed grasping his hips, "never mind."

* * *

><p>He left Van blubbering round the silver Organoid for what felt like a very long time, gazing stubbornly out the cave front. There was something immensely awkward about hearing the other young man sob with gratitude for his fortune. It rankled his spine to consider, very harshly, that just a second ago they'd been engaged in a pleasant nearly sympathetic discussion.<p>

It occurred to him, nearly making him start, that if the Organoid was conscious Van might be leaving very soon. It had only been a day or two but part of him was already pleased to see the backside of Van disappearing off into the sunset. Still that niggling pain in his gut which had, till just now, vanished from the moment he found the brat had reemerged much louder than before.

_We should run away_.

That was the stupidest idea Raven had ever let pass through his head and his nails dug into the stone at the concept. Shadow growled at the silver Organoid hotly and backed towards Raven suspiciously his tail brushing the boy's back. The beast obviously wanted a clear gauge of the dimensions of where Raven was and where his supposed foe was in case the silver Zoid made a move. Raven ignored it. Why on Zi would he run away? He loved his home and his job. Just this morning he wanted to be back there. Loyalty and discipline were heavy set in him.

He forced that niggling pain down deeper, much deeper, and tried to diminish it. He was much more logical than this rampant nonsense (or at least he _considered_ himself more logical). Van stopped crying beyond his vision and Raven threw himself back up onto his feet almost anxiously retreating from the possibility Van would come back round the Zabre in a second.

"I'll be back in a while!" He called distantly. "Getting food!"

"Thanks!" Van cried, breathless, and at the moment he did sound intensely grateful.

* * *

><p>Raven was nearly twisting his hair out with that insufferable, implacable, feeling gnawing at him when he returned. He'd bitten half his nails off in a show of childishness not seen since he was eight. He was lost between wanting to punch something, eat his feelings like a menstruating girl and curling up into a ball like an inmate at an asylum. (Had he gone off his mood stabilizers too soon? There had been arguments in favor of that line of thought for at least a year but Hardin and Prozen were stubbornly in the camp that they were '<em>bad for his development of proper coping skills<em>' or some-such who-ha he didn't like right about now…)

Van was still rubbing at his eyes despite the great lengths Raven had gone to in order to extend his absence in hope of avoiding the whole affair. Luckily for both of them the Republican seemed just as embarrassed by his show of emotion and plucked himself up with all that hormonal teenage bravado to change the subject.

"Proper meals again today? Living life to the extreme are we?" He joked lightly as Raven threw down the horde but he floundered a little as the Imperial abandoned him to rummage in their existing supplies. "Hey! Whatcha doing?"

"Cooking." Raven revealed simply as he returned with the necessary cutlery.

Van blinked, lost again, and formed his next words very carefully. He had a sense now of when Raven was on the edge of snapping.

"I thought you didn't like cooking…?" he pried gently prepared to retreat at a moment's notice.

"I don't." The Imperial snapped. "Shut up."

"Yes Sir!" Van cried which, from the diminishing look Raven shot him, was counterproductive. So he thrust on, still cautious, but doomed; "what we having?"

"_Food_." Raven returned shortly and Van seemed to catch the message more fully now to cease yapping and wire his trap shut.

So Van silenced his gob and Raven went about the business of haphazardly assembling a meal. Normally he was quite a competent cook, able, even if lazy in his usual execution but cooking was something that if your guardians did it often enough you seemed to pick it up via osmosis especially if food was part of the social life of the family in question. In the Prozen household there was usually only time for the essentials like eating so food was certainly part of Raven's…bonding for lack of a less sulky word. Yet he found himself stumbling, found things not turning the right color or consistency, found his anxiety surging and his mood failing till he wanted to throw up his hands and cry in a monumental hissy fit he almost did carry through.

Van kept his mouth shut but as Raven tugged at his hair, giving a rather confined scream of frustration down his throat, burying his face in his palms so he could bat at his eyes with them the Republican snatched up the pan and went to clear it out outside clumsily. Then Van sat back on his crossed legs, tugged the groceries closer as Raven ran through his tantrum internally, and started his own attempt. Raven put it down to the Republican's amazing metabolism and unending hunger that he took matters into his own hands but some, stubborn, part of Raven begrudgingly admitted it was kind of Van.

Raven sniffed, turning his face away to clear up his burning eyes, and let the other boy assemble something meager with his good arm and his resourceful imagination. Raven supposed his sudden inability, stress related or whatnot, was karma. He had been dreadful to try and cook around as a child. Anything Prozen did outside of paying Raven immediate attention was considered treason and had to be ceased immediately. He was a greedy, selfish, brat.

"Just like Ma used to make," Van joked switching off the burner and generously passing Raven the only fork currently in his possession to eat directly from the pan, "dig in."

"Thanks," Raven mumbled taking the little implement without ever touching Van's own fingers while the Republican dug in the with only spoon.

After a few very cautious mouthfuls Van, who still appeared like he was eating from a trough, cast a nervous eye over Raven for his appraisal. The Imperial pondered for a moment. Whatever this omelet-ish concoction was he'd certainly never had it before and he wasn't sure if it was entirely to his tastes. He'd wanted to recreate home comfort food and this was an entirely different cuisine but it wasn't dreadful by any means.

"It's actually okay," he conceded to Van's blossoming grin, "not what I felt like but decent fair. I'd have it again happily if you shoved it under my nose."

"Give me something better to work with and I'll make ya something nicer." Van swore in testament to his skill.

"Give me a better day and I'll make something in general," Raven snorted, "I feel like shit today."

"I hear I'm an excellent listener."

"Bullshit."

"Kay maybe," the Republican confessed, "but I_ am_ a professional hugger."

"I'm sorry, did you say professional _failure?_" Raven droned distantly. "Didn't know you could be qualified in that but I guess anything's possible."

"Fine! Then I won't tell you I'm an even better kisser!" Van huffed crossing both arms awkwardly round the stint.

There was a moment of awkward silence that passed over them and in it Shadow seemed to cough a shuffle further away. Raven scoffed fiercely as the Organoid abandoned him. They'd been developing a bond these past few days, closing ranks against Van and Zeke, but it was terribly subject to Raven's changing mood. Still Raven sent Shadow a little vibe of mental displeasure loudly enough in a way he never would've done previously when he was so intent on keeping the Organoid away from his mind and his body.

"Are you a good kisser?" Van prodded eventually and Raven had the sudden urge to seize the spoon from Van and gouge his own eyes out because nothing could be more painful than Van's damn obtrusive, suggestive, questions.

Raven was, after all, trying very hard not to think about his minor episode of retardation this morning which had ended in kissing the Republican. Something he quite hoped Van was totally ignorant of but he was beginning to suspect otherwise.

"I wouldn't know." Raven confessed. "The only people I know worth kissing are family."

"I…" Van considered his next words very carefully and Raven gave him a look which warned him to the same effect. "I think you're pretty great. Didn't really give me a chance to…ah, participate but… awesome, just so ya know."

If Van turned a deeper shade of red than the one he was presently sporting Raven suspected he'd get sunburn. Then again his cheeks seemed to be burning in an altogether unfamiliar way of their own. Raven was in a rage so momentarily deep he was too angry to move and then he became lost in whether or not he should be mad.

"Ah…" Van fumbled as Raven considered de-boning him. "Can I kiss you?"

The angry little gesture Raven made with his chin was rather inconclusive so Van decided it best not to move till he received a sign more precise. Raven stared at him a moment longer then and then appeared to resolve to something, whether it was bad or good Van wasn't immediately sure, but in the next second Raven had the pan on the stone and was well… _pouncing_.

Van squealed, for lack of a manlier world, when Raven lunged at him. The Imperial's hands secured on Van's shoulders and his knees mounted the boy's thighs till Raven was practically in his lap and the weight, the momentum, of him forced Van down onto his back with a head rattling crack of contact between skull and stone. Raven growled, or was it a hiss? It was a bad sound either way but Van really kind of liked it. He put it down to the contact and the memory of the morning's kiss. Van just knew he'd been asking for trouble but he was a greedy, ambitious, sucker.

"_You were awake_."

Van's mouth opened but no real words came out. Raven's voice was sharp enough to leave lacerations but the burning vermillion all over the Imperial's cheeks countered it pretty nicely.

"I-I… You kinda jumped me!" Van defended. "I didn't want to make you feel weird about last night! Then ya scared the crap outta me with all that kissing and I just sorta played dead! Can't kill a guy for that surely!"

"That a challenge?"

"Oh no! No! No!" Van felt his hands flail at that. "I just…I mean come on!"

He was at a loss to explain himself much better than that. Van's past make-out sessions, or attempts to generate make out sessions, had gone much more smoothly than this. So either Wind Colony kids were all blunt, bored and fearless or Imperial kids were all insane brain tumor infested time bombs (though that was probably just the Imperial he had the unlucky fortune of being stuck with. Damn Van had never wanted to be the kind of guy to like the "_Crazy-As-Fuck-Girl/Boy_".). To add to the stupid panic, as Raven glared down at him, there was currently a little voice blaring in his subconscious something to the effect of: _'Abort! Abort!'_.

Raven gave a strong hiss through his nostrils, fingers curling in Van's shirt, hefting the Republican's torso off the stone and tugging him up. Van's first instinct was to head butt his opponent but thank the gods he restrained it.

Then Raven kissed him again.

Oh shit. Van's toes curled in a fashion not totally called for. Raven had no idea what he was doing, true enough, but hell the pair of them were burning with whatever fell between panic, anger and hormones. The whole thing rendered Van needy enough to think that, hopelessly unfamiliar with using his lips for something pleasant, Raven was still crack hot _awesome_ to kiss. There was something he liked about Raven all red with embarrassment, especially knowing the Imperial could kick his ass, that made his heart beat faster than ever before (including that one May Fair night when the boisterous, buxom, sixteen year old Cory had showed him how to French a girl right).

Raven stopped, which was a crime, and there was a moment of eye contact Van perpetuated with his eternally dopey grin. Raven seemed to wither into a frustrated little growl, obviously this wasn't going how he intended, but undeterred Van leant as best he could into his hands and swopped up to snatch a kiss of his own making. Van made a point of being nicer about it. He made a point of being fluid, gentle, sweet and he meant it. He made his body as stable as possible, half sat, till Raven's weight was leaning into him and one kiss became, as it often did, a long progression of on-off touches between two sets of fumbling lips. Raven was a little fierce, his teeth nipped at the corners of Van's bottom lip more than once, but Van kept his pace slow, firm, wanton and the Imperial seemed to relent.

There was much less space the next time Van pulled back to check their progress. There was a hair's breadth between their noses and Raven had become very intent, even a little redder about the cheeks, and Van had to laugh.

"I like it when you're soft." Van tried to elaborate clumsily as he grinned. "Not that rough ain't sexy but…" he shrugged in explanation and Raven sat back properly on his own calves.

For a second Van half expected another turn of the tide, Raven to smack him round the head, but the Imperial helped him sit back up cross-legged as he had been before the Imperial had tackled him. Having Raven sitting on him made his legs painfully numb but he didn't much mind especially when the other hooked both arms round Van's neck, shoulders, and let Van hook his good arm about his waist.

"I feel like I'm losing my mind," Raven mumbled, their foreheads butting, noses brushing. "It's like I've got PMS."

"Yeah," Van wasn't going to argue with that, and Raven appeared mildly affronted particularly when he laughed. "It's cool though. I like you anyway."

"What if I break your other arm?" Raven proposed. "Cause I've thought about it."

"Hmm…" asking a hormonal teenager that question should've been fairly black and white but that was where the hormones came in. "Kiss me again and then ask me. I'd probably let you."

"You have no sense of self preservation."

"I think that might be a good thing round you." He joked and Raven actually half laughed. Van took his cue to snatch another kiss with that permission, softly, and the Imperial's hands ran up his neck to cup his jaw exploratory and sweet.

Van's tongue darted over his own lips and contact got a little slick from there on out. Matter of fact so did the whole night, much to Van's great delight, but for concerned parents everywhere nothing _serious_ occurred. Though the definition was what counted as serious was stretched beyond any limits Van had previously maintained between that night and the next day.

Years of hindsight would blur the memory to Van significantly but the overall effect would remain to stir some warmth in his gut if nothing else. The most prevalent images he'd recall would be an odd mix of soft and harsh. Really the only time memories of Raven were clear were on the odd occasions Van later had other lovers to compare with. No one else was quite as fascinated with tracing, kissing, the curves of his shoulders, neck and clavicle. No one fumbled along the indentations of his upper back so reverently as Raven did. Very few cupped his face, felt his neck, the way Raven did when Van kissed them. It was once in a blue moon Van discovered another human being with legs as tautly muscled that were till supple to the touch, like Raven's had been, even when they were hooked tightly round his hips. Van had never known another boy to nip his lips and run their fingers over his navel in such a confident direct contrast. Raven led Van, if nothing else, to be rather fascinated with the slender nature of girl's wrists, forearms and dainty, clean, fingers especially when carding through his hair or tangled with his. By nineteen Van would be thoroughly frustrated trying to find someone, anyone, who felt so warm in his arms, who was so naturally (if clumsily) skilled with him, who's thighs slickened with sweat the same way against his hips, who made him feel so proud, so content, so masculine and euphoric when they fell asleep around each other.

Raven would even ruin Fiona for him in a much less overt way through all this. Van could lay on Raven, one leg between the Imperial's, Raven's hands up his bare back, Raven's face in his neck and sleep perfectly subdued. Van could toss onto his back and let Raven throw one leg over his hips, resting his arm across Van's chest with fingers against his neck, while he half held the Imperial and the pair of them could rest warm and content. Van could roll onto his side with Raven's back against his chest, in his arms, Raven's face dazedly nuzzling the inner skin of his elbow and be in paradise. Whereas, as much as he adored his best friend, Fiona's amazing, wonderfully sweet and sincere, embraces could never stir the same blissful sensation of happiness, peace, _rightness_ after falling asleep half naked with Raven.

* * *

><p>Van didn't really, properly, exit the haze till the <em>next<em> night.

Raven curled away from Van as the Republican dragged himself up, snatching up the blankets round his pale body to nest more effectively, as Van rubbed his aching shoulders and yawned. He was very naked and he wasn't sure if they'd eaten or not recently given how the last so many hours had blurred together without any real markers of time. Zeke and Shadow were tucked away behind the Zabre and quite happy to stay there till their masters came back to their senses Van suspected.

"Hey," Van nudged the Imperial delicately, grasping the thin naked upper arm of the other boy while he muttered down into those plump cheeks. "Shower?"

"Hmm," Raven mumbled airily, knees curling higher face buried in their pathetic bedding. He blinked a little as Van lay some of his warm weight on Raven's back and it was a struggle to keep his eyes open. "Wha?"

"Shower," Van repeated with lazy good humor.

"M'kay…" he consented unenthusiastically shuffling under the Republican's weight too exhausted to be snippy or witty in any real way. Van was quickly discovering that if you kept Raven happy enough he was too content to be assed when it came to causing trouble. Definitely made the whole picture of the other boy more appealing when Van knew beneath the snark there was something you could cuddle without fear of losing vital limbs.

Van had very little fear of public nudity and it was nice to see Raven share that lack of concern as they handled the water tank on the back of the Zabre deftly. The weak, tap like, trickle that they ended up with was hardly a shower but drenching his hair under the water, even if it was frigid, was enough to make Van feel replenished. He mused his fingers through it sloppily to free up any remaining oil as Raven bent to work the water over his face and against the sleep in his eyes with his fingertips. The imperial groaned rolling his spine, straightened his back, as he extended his hands to the ceiling in a stretch. Van dug the view he stole but kept that to himself.

"Bout dinner time eh?" Van suggested.

"Hmm," Raven hummed as he worked his hand against the opposing shoulder to loosen the muscle, "how's Zeke?"

"Good," the Republican appraised not totally ignorant of Raven's change of subject, "you okay?"

"Hmm," as the other boy became more alert it was hard to miss how despondent he became. Van felt an unaccounted for unease.

"You're wonderful." It was half-hearted on Van's part but not because it lacked sincerity. He meant it but he felt as if he was drawing at straws to shake whatever was bothering the Imperial.

Raven gave a little sneer, the friendly sort, and squeezed out his hair as he tread away barefooted. Van watched, rubbing more water into his skin perhaps more because he was concerned to follow than because of necessity, as Raven tugged on a set of decidedly casual clothes and plunked down onto the sleeping bag to slip on his boots.

"I'll be back in a little bit," Raven announced, "I'll bring more food if there's any left in town."

"Uh…" Van's shoulders fell, "wait till morning?"

"I want to check the Shield Liger didn't get wet." The other dismissed beckoning to Shadow. "Back later."

"Yeah sure…"

* * *

><p>Raven had bit his nails to bleeding by the time he and Shadow found the Liger in the ambling afternoon sun. The cockpit was dry thank goodness and it was with a dull pair of hands and an unsettled stomach Raven sat, rather lifelessly, to try and mend the radio back to working order. He felt wrong, strange, disturbed…<p>

Raven didn't feel like himself, his skin felt new and acute, and his stomach almost painful with that uncomfortable guilt he hadn't been able to shift since finding the Republican. He still couldn't entirely trace why but he knew, or at least had a sense, that this wasn't going to end well and it made him jumpy. He wasn't certain what a _good_ ending would be for him where this was concerned either.

His head was in jumbles. He'd lost himself for a while there. He'd been… weirdly content and lighthearted and jovial. Van had made him laugh in the night, Van had stirred something altogether playful and easygoing in him, and Van had enticed him to speaking. In the flow of memories, mostly made up of kissing and stroking both experimental and adoring, Raven remembered curling round the Republican once and half a dozen things had fallen from his mouth. They'd spoken about siblings, about parents, orphans, about favorites, hobbies and displeasures in the day to day. Raven didn't normally share so much but more than he intended had just come spilling out without much hesitation or notice. Not all of it was secret information but some of it had been and a lot of it had been things he didn't discuss about himself. He'd told Van how much he disliked sleeping, he'd told Van how he wished he could call Prozen '_dad_' more often, he'd told Van about his two ridiculous '_cousins_' and how much he secretly adored the pair of them…

Raven found himself digging his teeth into his cuticles again. Shit. Why'd he said any of that? He'd gotten so swept up in this gooey, nearly sickeningly lightheaded, feeling of warmth that had made it nearly impossible to pull away from the other boy.

He fumbled at the radio and felt weaker by the second. Hardin had lectured him more than once about '_safe sex'_ and nonsense like that about '_making it special'_ and Raven had just fallen head first into the hay with some nobody from the other side of the border (which was certainly not what his imagination had in mind for the matter). He felt dirty not because he'd disliked any of what he'd just taken part in but because he perhaps should've thought about it, restrained himself, more than he had. As for Van he'd just been left, dumped, at camp which given what he'd told Raven about his past forays into adult-matters had never happened to the other boy. Raven was quite assured Van had never been rejected like this and somehow the fact he was the first to push the other boy away so carelessly bothered Raven. He felt that wave of guilt get stronger.

Raven was aware, too, that time was running short (especially since the last two days had run off with him) and it was with the greatest reluctance he fire up his own radio to tap into Marcus' network. To his disappointment Chad even sounded disheartened by something once he made out Raven's voice.

"Hey kid, I'm supposed to patch you through to Guylos HQ instead of Marcus," he recounted hesitantly like he expected Raven to rage, "sorry kid."

"Well put me through then," he sighed, "might as well. Go on."

"If they fire you my brother's got a great parts business." Chad consoled jokingly and Raven suspected that the business wasn't entirely legal.

"Couldn't afford me," he dismissed, "now go on get me Prozen then."

Raven knew he was in trouble. That went without saying. If communications had been told he was to be put through to Prozen shit had probably hit the fan in some regard. If Marcus had made a song and dance about him Raven swore-

"Prozen here."

_Fuck everything_.

"Hey," Raven sighed, "miss me yet?"

"_Raven?"_ What exactly Raven heard in that tone he didn't know; concern? Relief? Frustration? All of the above probably. "Where have you been? Marcus and Schubaltz have passed the Gougalas. They're heading to Osa."

"Long story."

"Don't give me that. You've made both of us look like idiots." Yeah, there was definitely frustration evident now. "I'm trying very hard_ not_ to make the Knights the laughing stock of the Empire, you know, and this doesn't exactly inspire confidence in either of us if my elites run off."

"I'm sorry." Raven conceded quickly, much too easily, and Prozen caught it with immediate doubt. The boy almost slapped himself in the silence that followed. Both of them knew Raven hardly ever apologized so generously. It wasn't at all like him to roll over.

"You have your mobile?" Prozen demanded suddenly.

"Yeah?" He blinked.

"Turn it on and call me."

Now Raven did slap his palm to his face. _Fuck!_ Private lines, expensive international phone calls, meant Prozen wanted a totally private, unofficial, conversation. Raven didn't know if he could take parental concern right now. He felt like he'd killed the cat or something.

Waiting for the dial tone was criminally painful but how Prozen jumped back into the conversation was worse still.

"What happened?"

"Nothing," Raven insisted fingers worrying the hem of his shirt as Shadow nudged the small of his back in concern, "I'm sorry. I'll be at Osa. Just give me twenty-four."

"_No_, don't give me than," Prozen snapped, "what happened? What's wrong?"

"I…" He fumbled for a lie because _'I don't want to talk about it' _wouldn't cover this. "I got beat up by some Mercs. They caught me off guard. I had to fix up the Zabre but everything's fine."

"Sounds like you," the man scoffed but very gently, "I still don't believe you though. Listen, if you can't handle this, it's alright. You're young. I can send in someone else. War's messy and I'm not asking you to take prisoners."

"No! I can handle it!" He snapped feverish at the prospect of losing his freedoms. "I'm fine! For fuck's sake… I'm… I just got set back alright?"

He expected Prozen to call him out for swearing at him but the adult seemed too invested in a thought to pick at Raven for that minor misdemeanor.

"Are you sure?" the man put it to him very precisely, very gently, till Raven nearly quaked with doubt. "You're sure there's nothing you want to tell me? Nothing I should know?"

"Definitely," no, Raven wanted to break up into pieces and cry at the man like he hadn't done in years. "If there was I'd tell you."

"Good," the concern he could pick up nearly killed Raven, "then make sure you meet up with Marcus and I'll be there at Helic to rendezvous."

"Sounds great." He sighed with obvious relieved emphasis.

"You're telling me," Prozen heaved on the other end, "you take care of yourself in the meantime. I'm serious."

"Will do."

"Good boy."

Raven only realized when he hit 'end call' that he had, for the first time, lied to Prozen about something_ important_. This was bad.

* * *

><p>AN: well the angst begins to get serious, which it so often does round this point in my stuff (I swear it's like a rent payment), but we'll try and cut that off ASAP because I really want to slap Raven when he gets to this bitchin. Hope Jamies enjoys as always!<p>

1. As far as the 'bible' and the 'church' on Zi go I'm not convinced they're Christians hence why I don't mention any deities in this. You however can speculate to your little heart's content about their gods (cause Karl implies they're Polytheists) so go right ahead!

2. Don't worry I'm going somewhere with Raven's "_gut feeling_". I assure you it's not just contrite 'he's torn up because he's in love!' nonsense (well alright, it is, but there's more to it than that so let's keep our pitchforks down for a moment longer).


	5. In which we all go our separate ways

AN: Sorry for the delay here folks University ate my soul then spat it back up. This is probably going to be the shortest chapter of the whole project but stick with me! I'm doing a big leap in time so this was the easiest way to tie the whole affair of nicely. Next chapter will be back to normal length.

* * *

><p>Chapter 5: <em>In which we all go our separate ways<em>

Van didn't know whether to count himself lucky or not when Raven returned. The last few hours tending to Zeke after Raven's rather blunt dismissal of his affection had left him reasonably disheartened. He was beginning to understand why Irvine found relationships of any sort such a bother, why he frequently told Van '_ya gotta set your terms early_', and why boys in the Wind Colony used to distress endlessly after developing some affection or another for a girl less than stable and more than a little manipulative. Boys' hearts were very tug-able Van was realizing and it was a sorry state to find himself in after a very sheltered introduction to romance. Did this count as romance? There was a lot more yelling than he'd imagined…

Either way he didn't get much of a chance to think of anything, to form any proper serious questions, when Raven returned. The imperial said nothing, he simply strode back inside the cave, and Van had hardly become aware of his return before Raven had tossed down his bag loudly and plopped himself in Van's lap. Van raised his head to form some comment which died in his throat when in the same second Raven's hands ran over his cheeks and into his hair to tug him close for an impromptu show of intimacy. Van's heart seemed to swell miraculously of its own accord at the kiss and he clutched the other boy so close Raven gave a little coo.

"Are you-" Van had drawn back to get to the crux of the issue but Raven promptly shut him up with a firm, insistent, tongue wrapping round his own. So Van gave up the ghost of trying to understand any of the Imperial's logic, happy again for the moment, while Raven let him roam freely with his hands and his mouth.

Raven kept his their mouths shut for most of the night till Van's energy was so thoroughly depleted he couldn't form a thought let alone say it. The Republican collapsed into a hot heap near midnight, just as the air was cooling, exhausted as his restless companion somehow found the energy to pepper Van's sweaty body with little flourishes of tenderness. It was the first, not to mention probably the last, time Van really thought of the other boy as disastrously kind in any way. When Raven sunk down to lie next to him, when he let Van hold him, a warm palm running over Van's indented navel the Republican couldn't have been happier anywhere on Zi.

Van found it all very conflicting. He was confused yes, uneasy and unsure about what vague mysteries were rolling about in Raven's mind that the Imperial wouldn't share, and uncertain about the exactness of whatever he felt for the other boy. Still Van was, illogically no doubt, so unnaturally pleased with everything. He didn't know much about the world, let alone his own kinks, but Raven somehow scratched a secret little place inside him (metaphorically speaking). He liked the other boy when he stopped fussing and was pliant like this, when he relaxed, truth be told Van was even beginning to like him when he was mean. Raven had stopped being generally offensive (though he was still offensive) and had become funny much in the same way Irvine had. He was still a jerk but he was a comrade more than an enemy which changed the whole dynamic of the sass he sprouted. He buffed up Van's own sense of himself somehow, in a totally selfish way, Raven made Van feel special, important, even if he did tease him (and his culture) silly.

What Van wanted in his companions, lovers specifically, would become clearer with age but in that puppy-ish first love moment he couldn't explain the how or why but he was sure he did like Raven just the way he was.

He should've asked more questions, should've plucked up some energy, but he didn't and he'd rue that, more than anything, for years to come. All that aside he was as contented as he could be for those couple of hours and never more so than when Raven nestled against him and he faded off to sleep warm, nude and satisfied.

* * *

><p>Van was a bleary mess when the sun rose. Raven roused them much too early so with his good arm over his face Van took the opportunity to take in the back of Raven's neck as it flashed in and out of sight through his hair. He was yawning loudly when the other boy zipped up his combat suit, rising to flitter about their disastrous camp, and when he finally did pull himself up Van's first thoughts were fairly trivial.<p>

"Food?" He yawned which did little but to earn him a slap in the face with his own bundled up clothes as Raven tossed them at him. "Omph!"

"Get dressed." Raven ordered briskly ducking in and out of view around the Zabre as he straightened not only his things but buckled his boots. The Imperial seemed to have four hands when he wanted too and Van, a useless heap, tried not to disturb the productivity by struggling into his things.

Raven's general morning moodiness was becoming fairly common now he supposed. He was getting accustomed to it. It was just like Moonbay's incessant dawn singing, hollering, when she wanted their camp packed up or Irvine's grumpy swatting till he got his first coffee. Matter of the fact the only person Van knew who liked mornings was Fiona and that girl was just plain special all round.

"So what's the plan for today?" Van threw out offhandedly into the conversation as he reveled in the pleasure of stretching on his feet. He was definitely feeling better even with the lack of sleep the copious fondling was still very beneficial to his health.

"You're fucking off." Raven declared casually.

"_Wha?_"

"I'm heading off," he elaborated in response to Van's gawking, "I have to catch up with the division."

"You…you're just going to abandon me?"

"Oh don't be so dramatic," Raven diminished with a roll of his eyes, "you're almost healed, I got your radio working and your bloody Organoid can move again. You don't need me to hold your hand all the way back to your posse."

"But…" Van felt as if someone was either playing a very cruel joke on him or there must've been two Ravens (one with sweet kisses and one that killed puppies). He had that empty, bottomless, feeling in his gut that someone had tugged the rug out from under him just now. "I thought…you…"

He didn't know how to word whatever was taking place in his head which seemed to pester Raven to no end.

"What are you prattling about?" He demanded stoutly. "What on Zi did you think was going to happen?"

"I thought…" it sounded very stupid before Van even let it out. "I guess I thought you'd quit the Empire. I thought you'd come with us."

"Don't be stupid. Why would I do that?"

"You mean," Van felt very cold suddenly, "you're just going to go right back to killing Zoids? That didn't mean anything?"

"What should it have meant?" Raven snorted. "We fooled around Van that's not exactly life changing. You can't have honestly expected me to bugger off with you, be realistic here, that isn't at all practical."

"But!" There was a surge of pure panic in his chest. "You can't be serious! You're just going to pretend nothing happened?"

"I barely know you!" Raven reeled as if Van was the stupidest boy alive. "Will you listen to yourself? I have a family, I have a job to do, and I happen to quite enjoy it. We made out Van and, contrary to popular belief, you cannot cure my loathing of Zoids with a few dirty kisses. You mean to say, seriously, that you think I'll just up and drop my whole life, my entire way of being, my family, and everything that makes me proud to bugger off with some boy I met two weeks ago? You're kidding. I don't even know your last name."

"You can't mean that!" Van supposed messily. "No one could enjoy killing people for a living!"

"I rather do," the other snapped, "I_ hate_ Zoids Van. I made that clear enough when we met. I care about the war. I want Prozen to win. I want to be a proper Knight. It's important to me. It might be hard for you to understand but I don't want to gallivant around some nobody and I've got no interest in whatever bloody nonsense your Zoid Eve is."

"But…" Raven however seemed intent to drive the point him with brutal intensity.

"Listen to yourself. None of this has any effect on who I am or who you are. We made out, we stole a few days, we had some fun but that's not the real world. This was just some silly holiday, a lapse in my good judgment, and now it's time to go back home. What did you think you'd done to change any part of my personality these past few days? We haven't so much as discussed anything really important. We have almost nothing in common. Besides I don't even owe you an explanation to begin with! You're lucky I'm saying goodbye! We're not friends, we don't know each other, we had two fights and a few nights and that's it. Kid," the complete absence of his name somehow enraged Van, "if you _really_ want to make something of this let me clear it up nice and simple for you: when it comes right down to it I've known Prozen a hell of a lot longer than you. I've made promises to him. Are you saying you'd dump your sister for a stranger you met at a bar? Don't be stupid."

Van felt his insides burn up. Raven had obviously been thinking about that little tirade for quite some time and was clearly pleased to have it out if the way he eased was anything to go by. The sense that he'd been thinking this, while Van's imagination had run away with him, somehow felt more intrusive, more brutal, than anything Raven had actually said. The Imperial was so nonchalant about this, so casual, that Van felt a right fool for having expected anything different.

What _had_ Van expected anyway? He asked himself that almost in reflex as it hit him that, really, Raven was right. Of course this hadn't changed anything. Van almost turned red with the realization that, despite everything he knew, some part of him had been coming up with fantastical expectations of how this would all tie off. He knew he'd go back to his friends but he hadn't seemed to come the conclusion that it also meant Raven was going to leave and they would, their lives considered, probably never see each other again. The fact they'd met at all was a rare chance encounter of serendipity. So why did Van feel so…betrayed? So tossed aside? This didn't make any sense but Raven still cut at him with things that were perfectly reasonable.

What was of value to Raven, what made him proud, what he wanted to strive for was still the same and given what he'd told Van what could be more horrid for him than a road trip, picking up odd jobs, unknown and irrelevant to the war? It wasn't what he'd evidently been raised for whereas Van, much to his own surprise, had been raised off of dreams of something grander expecting to ride off into the sunset.

"You're serious," Van comprehended painfully, just saying it seemed to end all familiarity between them as logic, reality, seeped back into his world.

"No shit."

"I should've known," he swore to himself stupidly hitting his hands against his head, "fuck…"

"I never pretended to be anything." Raven scoffed but he weakened in his crass nastiness just a smidgen at the contorted, pained, and helplessly frustrated expression crossing Van's face as the republican dug his fingers into his hair.

"Why did I think…?" Van couldn't seem to come full circle with that thought let alone end the sentence.

"Life sucks. Welcome to growing up."

Van's hands fell and the last few days vanished into insignificance as he surrendered any more silly claims their importance. It was as if they'd never really happened because when Van looked up properly Raven seemed just a foreign, unlikeable, and unfathomable as he had when they'd first met running from Major Ford. There wasn't any new understanding between them. It was as if Van knew nothing about Raven, and the Imperial knew nothing about him, beyond their names. Van felt that he'd gone back to his normal self suddenly with a rubber band kind of _twang_ and looking over Raven he knew that the other had likewise done the same.

They looked at each other for moment or two. Raven stiff, proud and unfriendly Van hopelessly slumped, dirty, and common looking from his head to his toes. There was nothing at all alike between them cosmetically which seemed to thrust home all the rest they didn't say. Van wondered briefly if the other would make him swear to keep his mouth shut about all this but Raven didn't and in that Van terribly comprehended why. Van saw, in a flash, that they moved in such different circles that he would never cross anyone important enough to Raven to divulge any secret and furthermore all of this was possibly more embarrassing, more grotesque, to Van than to the Imperial.

Van had never _felt_ lowly, he'd never _felt_ a poor illiterate farm boy, but chewed up and spat out Raven didn't have to insult him any more to the effect for Van to feel it now. All those nasty words he had for Raven, Zoid-killer the whole lot, came rushing back with a string of new insults: prim, moody, nasty, cruel, prejudiced, insane… Van could go on and in his mind he did all through their awkward moment.

"I'm going." Raven spoke finally without the slightest air of secret kindness. "Your Liger's not far off. You'll see the horde outside. The radio works. Your Organoid should be able to make it moveable again easily."

No well wishes, no concern, no friendliness, no warmth just expectation he evidently doubted Van could live up to. Van very much wanted to hit the other boy, as a matter of fact all the violence he'd seen Raven commit during their first fight appeared in keen detail nastier than before, but even more so he wanted to slap himself as he nodded.

"Kay," he shrugged like a disobedient school boy, "thanks."

Why had he ever kissed this jerk? Why had Raven ever_ 'lowered'_ himself to kissing Van? Was it all just a hot, bored, whim? Probably Van rued. He'd let his testosterone carry him away. Maybe deep down he'd wanted to be special to some big shot, someone exciting and different, as part of his big adventure and his budding hero complex?

"Come on Shadow." Raven snapped his fingers, without so much as glancing at Van, as he strode briskly past him and mounted the Zabre Fang.

So with that non-existent acknowledgement Van turned to beckon Zeke closer. The Organoid scampered near, whimpering in confusion and hesitation, as they cleared themselves out of the way of the retreating Zoid.

* * *

><p>Now luckily for Van fate had plenty in store to turn him from nobody into one hell of a legendary somebody in a short turn of years. That realization, that he was important, didn't so much swell his ego as it did his confidence in the long run. It was more a band aid against the doubt Raven had planted in him than something that made him feel superior to anyone else.<p>

Van didn't tell Fiona, or Moonbay, or Irvine what had happened during his disappearance then or later. When he dragged himself back to the camp site they had swept him up with open arms (and a few stray tears) and let him sullenly recount the tale of his escape from the horde. Van tried to clear Raven from the picture entirely but he wasn't at all in the mood to lie stupendously enough to make it sound like he'd done anything amazing. He made the whole incident a dull story of how he'd stupidly run into danger, got his ass kicked, hid and had to heal before coming back. Moonbay had scolded him, Irvine had consoled him with years of his own experience and Fiona could not stop hugging him. Having their acceptance, their familiarity and endless concern softened a lot of things but it didn't erase them.

If Raven told anyone about their mess Van didn't know but very much doubted it. Cruelly enough they ended up frequently in each other's way and Van took it as a personal triumph to force Raven back from causing harm to others. Those few days fortified him against being too kind without good cause in a very harsh lesson and his continuing, growing, relationship with the Imperial boy took on its own silent unacknowledged significance to the pair of them.

He reveled in gaining the upper hand over Raven in New Helics but for a second, with Herman in the backseat coaching him on, he very nearly had fun in combat with Raven. That was all too easily remedied when Raven's violence at the volcano, the sacrifice of the Zabre Fang, scared Van straight out of his sympathetic lean once more.

His hatred rose and fell over that year: he hated Raven with every fiber of his being when he destroyed the Shield Liger, when he killed (they assumed) Rosso and Viola, he was stirred to pity Raven the more he learnt of and when he eventually encountered Prozen (who Raven had spoken so lovingly of which Van couldn't at all account for), and then when the Geno Surer was destroyed Van struggled with oddest sensation of relief, guilt and glory.

* * *

><p>AN; my apologies again for the short chapter but chapter 6 is up very soon! With a lot more giggles and a lot more clarity. Hope you like Jamies!<p> 


	6. In which an immovable object meets an

AN: And we're back with a decently sized chapter! Enjoy, the giggles are back, and Raven gets a taste of his own medicine.

* * *

><p>Chapter 6: In which an immovable object meets an unstoppable force…<p>

_Nearly Six Years Later_

After defeating the Ultimate Death Surer (in a spectacularly _stupid _fashion) Raven was pretty settled that if he ever saw Van Flyheight again he would jet it out of there as fast as his little legs could carry him. The monumentally awkward moments he expected after their long and disastrous…well _relationship_ was a bad word in this context; rivalry (to be cliché) were things he was quite happy to avoid with all his might. Especially after Reese's little mind rape had turned his sense of reality upside down .

Van didn't make avoiding him easy mind you. He'd never been the kind of guy to stay in a big city long, country hick at heart, and he roamed the whole goddamn planet with the same ease and familiarity Raven did like the whole place was one giant sandbox. Sure it made finding him unlikely but it made flat out avoiding him near impossible so Raven had to pray statistics were on his side for the likelihood of a chance encounter (which they rarely were). What was more frustrating still was that, after the yearlong campaign Van had headed cleaning up Hiltz' mess, he'd left active duty in the Guardian Force and dropped completely off the public radar. Mother fucker didn't like being so famous apparently. Raven didn't like the GF but at least they'd been so loud it was kind of hard _not_ to spot them coming.

Raven hadn't ever considered what exactly he'd say to Van if they ever met outside or inside the cockpit again. He wasn't the same… person, thing, brat, _whatever_ anymore like when he'd smashed Van's ass off cliffs and kissed him with all the clumsiness of a dumb teenager. Time and recovering his earliest memories had settled that. They'd made quick work of his ruthlessness, his shitty attitude, his pessimism and ego. Oh they weren't gone, gods no, but let's just say some of his worse qualities had been seriously neutered by the memory of Dan Flyheight and the Death Surer debacle.

What was more Raven was, actually, a little embarrassed. He and Van stood for things now. They weren't up and coming names in the battle field they were global legends in the history books. That was something way too heavy to deal with. The war had fucked with them, or at least morphed Raven, Van was now actually a fairly big part of his life, his past, his sense of self, and his direction. Van was important now, to him, not just some hick with a snotty nose and broken arm who made an alright omelette. Raven was never very good at talking to people once they were important to him. Raven didn't want to remember more than he had to, he wanted to go forward, tail between his legs or not and just disappear into obscurity.

Raven avoided public events like the plague. So long as Rudolf gave him a pardon he was not going to get some medal. So long as Reece didn't tell them were to send invitations he wasn't going to any parties either. He probably made the whole thing a hell of a lot harder than it needed to be. Maybe he'd become a coward but he was quite happy to be one. Cause if his mind kept dragging out nightmares he'd never sleep in Prozen's home again and so long as he could see Dan's face in his head or remember Van's scent he was never _ever_ going to put himself in a situation where the now two-time Hero could bring it up.

He didn't _think_ Van was looking for him but he couldn't discredit the skill and intuition of the crazy ass punk who by this point knew him better than anyone else still living especially not when any relative closeness to each other had always caused the air to electrify with dangerous coincidence.

His whole coward thing was going fairly well surprisingly, for a year and a bit anyway, then he ruined everything in an exuberant little slip of foresight.

* * *

><p>The Republic was fucking hot. Burn your face like an egg hot. Their shambled deserts were certainly not as pristine as the tour brochures would have liked to present them either. The sheer amount of trash, of explosives, of <em>junk<em> left by nomads and fleeing civilians, the sink holes, the mine shafts desperately dug out in search of gold… Republican deserts were more dump heaps than untouched wilderness. Though that was utterly ignoring the amount of wreckage Raven had made to clutter up said deserts of course. Moving right along! Still; the desolation, the space, was kind of welcoming to Raven. A nice harsh place where lots of idiots weren't packed in little houses and Mother Nature slapped you frequently for your transgressions.

When he wandered along the outskirts of one ugly tiny village it was more out of an inclination, in one of his mood swings, than for any real purpose. He'd left Shadow, his combat suit and the Geno Breaker at a safe distance. Frankly bringing an Organoid into a town of hicks was asking to be robbed, rapped and gawked at. Shadow didn't like being apart, he had that mother hen desire not to let Raven out of sight, but what was the worst a bunch of desert scroungers could do? Terrify him with displays of poor education and inbreeding? Van had given him an immunity to that!

Raven cringed mildly at himself.

His palm collided with the side of his temple stubbornly as the mental static sprang up in full force that lovely morning. That little guilt ridden voice from his adolescents had only gotten louder since Reese gave him back his memories of the kind of goody-two-shoes he could've been and since his death Prozen's voice had reached critical mass. One side of the debating team insisted Van was the incarnation of paradise come down to the commons. The other was quite convinced they should toss him through a wood chipper and be done with it. No points for guessing who headed which team and how sick Raven was of it.

He let it fade by pushing it down like snuffing out a light and resumed stretching his legs. Once you got closer to the horrid cluster of domed ancestral homes it wasn't so hideous. The fields skirting and intermingled with the village were over stuffed with crops ripe for harvest, the dams were full, the cattle were loud with newborns. It was nice.

He skipped a pathetic chicken wire fence and weaved through the corn. He wasn't a fan of corn in ordinary circumstances but when it was still on the vine corn fields more than most others provided a sense of deep old world privacy. There was something very isolating and disorientating about them especially when the rustling blocked out all other sounds. The muggy, grey skied, painfully green vineyards of the Empire weren't so warm but still there was some tenuous similarity between them. Zeppelin used to drag them to vineyards frequently when the court went on progress. Prozen tended to spend the time on his cell, stolen away, letting Raven steal grapes off the vine as they strolled.

Gods he missed being little. He missed being so young that there wasn't a sharp, confused, pain in his chest every time he remembered something about Prozen good or bad.

The corn opened up to a strange little patch of land between four of the sections which apparently had refused to be settled by agriculture. There were heavy boulders jutting up between the grass and Raven guessed the family had been too poor to drag them out with Zoids and had settled for growing around them. Quitters, he decided, as he poised himself lazily atop one. What hick didn't know dynamite solved everything? Underqualified ones for sure he snorted good humouredly.

The air here was definitely cooler and he shrugged off his cloak and swung his legs quietly. With his eyes drifting shut he could've quite happily taken a nap if there hadn't been a four foot drop either side of him. For a moment the guilty voice of his inner good guy and Prozen's ghost conceded begrudgingly to each other it was a lovely day. No peace treaty in sight however despite the cease fire.

He leant back into his arms, flexing his sweaty toes in his boots, and listened. His mind hadn't ever grown out of screening for danger like a paranoid schizophrenic. He could hear rough rustling, shouting and cat calling not too far off and he knew in a very natural way some famer's kids were playing in the corn. It didn't bother him, probably should have but it didn't. They were just kids unable to see him. He should've left then but he was too comfortable to be bothered.

What was the worst that could happen he asked himself? If they were teenagers, mammoth six foot monsters, he'd beat em to Tuesday. If they were babies he'd dart off before they could catch him and give them a story to tell their parents. Heck if they were little girls like those who'd given Reese those seeds (which the pair of them had split to keep close as a reminder of important lessons well learnt) he might even oblige them with a conversation.

It was the second time in his life he'd underestimated bumbling country kids.

It was so easy to forget sometimes that Van, the Greatest Hero of Zi now, came from such simple and homely roots. Like this. Raven had trouble believing sometimes that the runt he'd shared sweat with at fourteen was the same man he shared blood with a year or two ago.

The kids got louder, closer, but their rambunctiousness was a lot more natural and much less distracting than a lot of other sounds Raven could name: screaming soldiers, Reese on her period, Shadow scratching, political speeches…. Probably wouldn't have been anyone else's top four but you get what you get.

He didn't even mind when they came falling through the nearest corn stalks onto the patch of grass in muddy heap. They fell in a pile like a pair of kittens forcing and kicking each other about somewhere between the ages of five and twelve between them. They didn't even seem to notice him over their trash talking. Kids were thick like that, amazingly self-absorbed, it was great. Raven snorted half under his breath and was just about to disappear when their supervising guardian made it through the corn after them.

"_Oi!_ Get off each other ya punks!" He was too boisterous for either of the runts to take him seriously but Raven certainly did.

He was tall, muscled, young and unmistakably virile. In a passing and thoughtless summary Raven decided he was very handsome. He wasn't their father Raven could tell immediately, older brother he might've suspected, but as the stimuli made it past his eyes into his brain he started recognising features on the man's face under the coating of mud splotched over him. Prozen's voice started screaming about strategic retreat and the warning bells were on fire. It wasn't until the man spotted Raven, looked him dead in the eye, that it all came together clearly.

When he broke into that radiant, world ending, smile Raven's entire body convulsed and petrified on the spot.

This was the Wind Colony and that was Van Flyheight.

_Fuck_.

He almost lost his lunch as his stomach churned to abandon ship in panic while the rest of him ran about internally screaming between fear and general chaos. The kids were still rolling about in their grassy nest, totally ignorant that anything important was going on apart from their epic battle, and didn't pay any attention at all when their guardian bounded over them. Raven was so dumbly stuck he found himself totally unable to move as Van grasped his legs and tugged him off the edge of the rock. He caught Raven easily as he slid down, arms locking round his middle, Raven's grasping round his shoulder's for purchase and when they stood very still Van was so tall holding him like this Raven's toes only half skirted the grass. Van squeezed him, face in his hair forcing Raven's against his neck, and it lacked any kind of venom at all.

Raven was bothered, stupidly, that Van was taller than him now and his hands mildly marvelled in the strength in those broad shoulders he certainly hadn't felt the last time they'd been this close to each other face to face. Fuck, had they been face to face since they were fourteen? Once actually, when Raven let the GF catch him to pass the time waiting for Shadow to hurry up and evolve the Geno Surer. They'd been playing then like they didn't remember at all anything apart from the battlefield but Raven could tell now, very much, that Van remembered.

Prozen's voice was cringing, Raven remembered the scars Van had given him in that rather blatant attempt to slaughter him (not like Raven could talk about who tried to kill who mind you), but then the guilty little voice pondered how much he now resembled Dan and Prozen's voice promptly gave up. Raven sort of knew he could get away if he punched Van now and took off running but he had some dignity.

He closed his eyes for a second, easing his panicked hands, caught Van's scent and waited for the Republican to let go. Eventually, slowly but surely, Van eased his grip till Raven's feet were back on solid ground and they were getting a good look at each other. How Van could still be smiling even when Raven looked like he might curl up and die was a mystery in and of itself.

The kids were only now starting to give a shit and Van's eyes hardly wavered when they started picking themselves up.

"Oi! Who's that?" The eldest slurred clearly not happy he'd been neglected of an audience during his latest epic showdown.

"Huh?" Van blinked half out of a trance, glancing almost over his shoulder, and appeared to come back to his senses. "Oh, this is an old buddy of mine."

"Is he a Zoid pilot?" The youngest pressed hopefully because, as all little boys' knew, that was the only thing that counted damn it.

"Amazing," Van swore and he almost let go of Raven to shift back round to face them but the arm round Raven's middle was stubbornly tight. "Now judging by the trajectory of the sun it's about time we got your sorry butts home to your Ma."

"_No!_" the chorus of pained moaning was almost in perfect harmony. Kids should start a band.

"Yeah, yeah, stop bellyaching." He laughed. "Go on! Off with ya! I'm not bringing you home to your Mamma that filthy. Go on! And you go straight home or I'll make sure you don't get dinner for a week!"

"Van you're a monster!" The eldest insisted tartly. "Ya supposed to protect the innocent."

"You ain't innocent." Van snorted pointedly to the boy, who turned an immaculate shade of crimson from his head to his toes, "yeah. You think adults don't have ears. I was in that hay loft before you were a twinkle in your Papa's eyes. You're just lucky I don't tell your Ma."

"What hay loft?" the youngest hollered, eyes flickering between Van and the brat furiously.

"Never you mind," he ordered, "off with ya!"

The eldest bunched up his fists, furiously embarrassed, and turned tail to pound off back through the corn. The youngest remained dumbstruck for a moment still evidently confused but then realized he was being abandoned and gave chase.

"Kids," Van grinned once the wind carried off the last of their crass expletives, "second cousins of mine, sort of, we're all kind of related round here."

Raven stood very cold and still very dumb.

"This is where you laugh and call me inbred." Van prompted casually still smiling wonderfully. His face fell weakly then when Raven didn't waver but he did his best to proceed. "You alright?"

Raven nodded curtly. Not his most eloquent moment but his feet were still preparing a retreat with all of his major faculties while someone tried to sit his heart down and get it an aspirin before it burst.

"You remember how to breathe right?" The Hero assessed teasingly and Raven snorted. "There we go! Signs of life!"

"Shut up," Raven snapped weakly in reflex, "you're not helping."

"You're talking." He reminded proudly. "Come on, you're wittier than this, would hitting me help get the ball rolling?"

"Don't even joke."

"Why not?" Van blanked honestly. "Seriously Raven don't look so freaked out. We're on the same side aren't we? World's all good, I'm not going to arrest you, what's wrong?"

"I think I'm having a minor incident of shock." He admitted.

"Yeah, well," the Republican did a very bad job of restraining his grin here, "that's what you get for avoiding me for a year and a half."

"Says who!" Raven screeched but to his great joy he wasn't blushing like a twat. "What if I was? Maybe I just couldn't stand your girl scout pitch to get me to join the Guardian Force tree house!"

"There we go!" Van laughed. "Much better! Now how bout lunch? You're too skinny. My place is just over there."

"All goes in one ear and out the other with you!"

"Not much in-between to make it stick." Van cackled.

"I'll break your nose. I swear."

"And I'll pull your pigtails." He teased and as Raven was already acutely aware at how juvenile he sounded his cheeks burned mildly. "Come on, none of my _Super Best Friends_ are around to embarrass you. Just you, me and my fat Organoid."

"What about your sister?"

"Married her off for some sheep," Van grinned, "I'm surprised you remember I have a sister."

"Course I remember," Raven scoffed.

"I ain't letting you run off," the Republican swore cutting right down to the quick of it suddenly, "not till I get to talk to you, especially not when you motored it out of there after we beat the Death Surer. We are going to talk about our feelings like we're a pair of high school girls on the rag and we are going to like it so help me."

"Bitch, bring it." Raven hissed. "I will drop your sorry ass right here and leave if I want. So don't you tell me what we will or won't do."

"I'm bigger than you." Van pointed out. "I am not giving up."

"Bigger and dumber." Raven reminded.

"Maybe but I can do this," and all of a sudden the arm round Raven's waist became very effective. It took Raven a second to realize the Republican had swung him over his shoulder like a caveman with a sack of grain but once he did he was not at all pleased.

"Put me down Flyheight!"

"Why?" Van pondered casually. "I've got a great ass. View can't be that bad."

"_Put me down!_"

"Not till you agree to talk about your feelings."

"I'll agree to no such thing," Raven spat, "I'll agree to eat your food in this poverty stricken little hovel but I firmly refuse to swear anything in relation to feelings!"

Oh how far they'd come since maturing.

Van was laughing though, heartily, and very carefully placed Raven back the right way up. His head was spinning from the blood flow but he still found time to be thoroughly furious that Van could now throw him about so easily. He liked it better when the punk was as scrawny as he was. Raven had gotten bigger mind you and he could throw Van easy but the sheer muscle tone needed to lift the other punk up wasn't in the range of possibilities. Firstly Van was too fat (sturdy maybe) and secondly Raven was built for piloting in tight cockpits not tossing round bags of flour.

"Deal then," Van supposed thrusting his hand out for Raven to take begrudgingly.

The Republican was doing a very good job at stirring him to alertness but Raven found himself slipping into uncomfortable thoughts in the interim of conversation. This wasn't where Raven wanted to be. He'd rather be tossing up his breakfast over the other side of the boulder and then back in his cockpit miles away. It wasn't Van's fault he just didn't want to think about certain things. Primarily Dan Flyheight and Raven's one time attempt to save Van's life both of which he'd had trouble _not_ thinking about since turning coat.

* * *

><p>Van was right. He was a better cook when he had more time and more ingredients. That or he had someone who loved him very much and gave him plenty of left overs to stock up his fridge. There was something novel about the way he had a working fridge (even if it looked like it was from the fifties) but no microwave only an ancient cast iron stove. There was something novel about the whole house really. Few rooms, sandstone and mud brick, older than either of them and home to generations of Flyheights no doubt filled with sparse but apparent heirlooms. These people obviously didn't have much, electricity was apparently new and seemingly no one in the whole damn village knew much about windows or everything that went along with them like privacy or cleanliness.<p>

Raven's subconscious punched him. He could've grown up in this house. _Holy flaming shit_. He nearly crumpled in on himself, mentally withering at the rocking cedar table, while Van heated lunch. The walls, the loom in the lounge, the rust on the stove all took on a totally new life in his eyes.

Would Dan Flyheight have cooked dinners like Prozen did? How did he tuck his children in at night? Was he always the sweet, endearing, chap who so impressed himself on Raven or was he someone else entirely when he was tried and grumpy? Was he some drunk village goon? Was he a good father before Prozen had murdered him? Fuck. Even if Van didn't know, thankfully, about their near miss sibling-rivalry he knew well enough by now their fathers had slaughtered each other. It was one thing for them both to be orphans it was another for Raven's father to have orphaned Van.

Gods he felt like the big bad wolf over for dinner and Grandma's house after eating her granddaughter for the entree. Way to repay the hospitality.

"Flyheight fare all done and dusted," Van announced spreading down the plates and Raven thought it was lucky he hadn't ever had to wait tables.

"So how many goats did you get for your sister?" Raven inquired, digging his fork cautiously through the mess.

"I got the house," Van grinned, "old village tradition. The boy of the family gets the family home and the girl moves in with her husband. If a bloke needs a new house his friends help him build it. I'm the only boy so when Maria got hitched I got the farm and the house."

"Lot of work?"

"Not really," Van shrugged, "family's been paying the Delleways to harvest and farm our land since Dad joined the army."

Raven snorted.

"What?"

"Nothing," he muttered, "just technically makes you gentry in the classical definition. Wealthy plantation owners and all that like back in the Empire only trashier."

"_Only trashier_is sort of the general distinction between the two." Van grinned. "Speaking of where's Reese and Shadow and all that?"

"Don't call a Lady trashy you gutter sniffer." Raven warned. "She's off with Specula and Shadow's back with the Geno Breaker."

"Are you together now?" The other prodded, rather stiffly at that, between hardy mouthfuls. Van still ate like a starving wrestler.

"If you mean: are we brushing boots? No. Never did. She's all the family I have left." He shrugged turning his fork rather pointedly at Van. "That's all you're getting from me on that. Where's your girlfriend and the fan club?"

"Moonbay's working with Dr D, Irvine's doing some tech testing, Thomas and Karl are straightening things up in the Republic Rebuild with Herman and Fiona's heading a new research project. She's not my girlfriend by the way. That's a terrible rumour started by you-know-who." Van clarified pointing his own fork right back to Raven's sceptical features. "Honestly! Fiona's too much of an angel for me, love her desperately, so it's my job to make sure she gets the best man alive. Nothing I wouldn't tell her but I wouldn't sleep with her either."

"You're gushing her praises enough."

"She's family, like the rest of the guys, of course I love her. She and Zeke are my best buddies. Doesn't mean just cause she's a girl I want to bonk her." He turned lightly pink at the mere suggestion. "Seriously, I spend all my time hopping between one night stands."

"You're kidding?" Raven scoffed bemusedly. "What happened to your sweetheart mentality?"

"Long testosterone filled story."

"Ew." He cringed. "I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt and assume that wasn't a trite metaphor."

Van smirked playfully and Raven was forced to throw his head back in shame at the Republican's inane, disgusting, puns.

"Eat," Van jabbed at Raven's forearm with the rounded edge of his fork, "you're bloody tiny."

"Ox," Raven snapped, batting his hand away. "Where's the Organoid?"

"Zeke? Asleep on my bed like the lazy bugger he is."

"Good to know nothing's changed."

"Has though, hasn't it?" Van supposed, the Republican gave a weak shrug as he spoke, idly tossing about his own meal with a distant eye. "We're on the same side now aren't we?"

"Yeah," Raven conceded, "I don't want to live like that anymore."

"What happened? Was it Shadow?"

"Sort of," and Prozen going mad, Hiltz turning on them, Reese dragging up his memories, the world ending… whatever Raven thought was most important in that cluster fuck seemed a little hard to construe.

"Sort of what else?" Van insisted.

"I don't know," Raven shrugged uselessly, "does it matter? You want a play by play break down of my break down?"

"Pretty much."

"Oh fuck off," he sneered, "I don't owe you anything."

"Yeah you saved my life," Van agreed, "just wish you'd stuck around so we could talk. Fighting on the same side was…amazing. It was epic. I wish we could do it again. I wish you'd join the GF and be part of my friends and let new people like you. You can have more than three friends, ya know?"

"I just slaughtered half my family, _ya know?_" Raven spat. "Let's see you run off to play after you kill the last human traces of your father. After you watch people you've known all your life go insane and try to cannibalise you. Sorry if my grieving interrupts your after school special."

"I don't mean it like that!" The republican moaned exasperatedly. "You ever think maybe putting yourself out there and letting other people help you might be a good thing? That maybe if you moved on with a new life it'd help you get through stuff better? You're so damn offensive to kindness and your own happiness. It's destructive."

"Me? Destructive?" He chortled. "I never would've guessed! Your friends shouldn't just _have_ to like me now Flyheight. Just because we're not technically on opposite sides doesn't mean we have any common ground."

"_I _like you!" Van shot. "I have things in common with you! I'd like to spend time with you and go on an adventure! I'd sure as heck like to be a healthier buddy than two madmen and a girl with serious jealousy issues!"

The dish in front of Raven very suddenly collided with the wall by Van's head.

"Shit!" The Republican lunged to one side fluidly as it shattered and from the bedroom Zeke came running scrambling over the bedding so loudly he had obviously fallen on himself in the process.

"Say it again," Raven prompted, "go on! Insult me some more!"

"Oh the irony!" Was all the spite Van could manage to get out in the next breath before Zeke had slid along the stone floor sideways into the kitchen.

The Organoid whined very loudly at Van then in his frantic sweeping of the room caught sight of Raven and became bitterly quiet. Zeke glanced sharply next to Van very much a '_the hell is he doing here?'_ vibe passed between them but clearly enraged and exasperated Van shook his head into his hands. Left without clear instruction Zeke took one more look at Raven, ducked his head, and scampered away giving the Imperial as wide a girth as possible.

"I should go." Raven sighed his chair scrapping harshly against the stone as it rattled back and he moved so quickly that when the damn thing toppled back behind him he had to retrieve it and set it straight.

"Please don't," the Republican appealed gently, "I'm sorry about that. I'm too used to not having manners round you."

"You have manners in general?"

"I know, the thought makes me a little faint sometimes," Van chuckled weakly. "I am sorry though that wasn't right."

"It was reasonable," Raven allowed now more pliant, "they were bat shit."

"Doesn't mean you didn't love em though."

"Something like that," yeah Raven did, family history inclusive and not mentioning whether Van counted as family or not (not mentioning anything at all in this case). "I should still go. Shadow's going to have kittens."

"Let him," Van appealed, "he knows how to find you."

"True," he found himself lingering, it was harder to be with Van without a load of steel between them and a lot of onlookers. "You know there are a lot of people who wouldn't try and decapitate you over a meal."

"All the good ones have tried at least once. Irvine almost crushed me under the Command Wolf and Moonbay used to threaten to let me starve. Stick around?"

"Can't hurt for a while." He surrendered against his better judgement. He'd regret this if the house didn't suffocate him with memories of Dan Flyheight or his son didn't drive him mad first. At least Van seemed happy about the agreement (probably had a brain tumour).

"You know," Van had leant back now as if inviting Raven to sit back down and breathe again, "you look really good with your hair long."

What? Oh, right, Raven's fingers ran instinctively over the hap hazardous braid that had fallen over his shoulder. Compared to Prozen's swathe of hair it was nothing extraordinary but it was longer than he'd had it in eons. It fell mostly in his face and made a mess of his features, softening everything, and it seemed to have no interest in cooperating with any attempts to restrain it.

"Thanks," he took the seat again and found himself being surprisingly honest, "you look good too."

"Not so scrawny anymore?"

"Definitely not." Raven agreed. If Van looked any more like an action figure he'd need to get a trademark but for the moment he was smiling like a comic book hero and all too pleased with the world.

Usually this was the part where Raven swooped in and fucked up his day, generally with explosions and threats lodged at any number of institutions, but this time he didn't think it would be so easy. For one thing Van wasn't as naïve as he used to be and for another Raven had lost his licence to chaos, effectively neutered and tempered by time. For the moment he'd have to settle for planting his chin in his palms and thinking of a counter attack to get out of this village without totally giving himself away.

* * *

><p>AN: Next chapter is the last and it's padded with extra weight so see you soon. Hope you liked as always Jamies and special shout out to Rein Hitomi.<p> 


	7. In which Raven sets the record straight

AN: Final chapter guys~ please enjoy! Check the author note at the end for some special updates and big shout out to Jamies hoping she enjoys the finale.

* * *

><p>Chapter 7:<em> In which Raven sets the record straight and Van totally ignores him…<em>

The bed that used to hold Van's sister smelt like dried flowers and when Raven kicked he could feel dust, sand and the odd flake of foliage in the sheets. The blankets were thick and heavy and felt too much like woven rugs than actual bedding. Still it was quiet, warm, and oddly homey in a strange yet very comforting way. It was definitely better than a sleeping bag in the middle of nowhere. Raven practically borrowed down, arms between the pillows, hair over his ears and slept so deeply he barely heard Shadow slip into the house, with a hiss like a rattle snake, and plant himself on the floor.

At dawn he was painfully groggy and his eyes burnt when he tried to part his lids. He and Van hadn't spoken last night so much as watch the news and gone to bed early so it wasn't as if he was exhausted. Still every limb in his body had apparently sunk into the gooey mattress and had no interest in moving. The house was still cool from the night but the light reflecting off the walls was starting to intensify and it was with supreme effort he managed his limp body out of bed.

He showered quickly. He knew from experience if he didn't do it now he wouldn't feel dry all day with the intense heat this region generated during the body of the day. By the time he crept out it was nearing eight and he could've sworn the sun rose at four am given how listless he felt. He slipped back into his pants and rifled through the bag Shadow had thought to drag with him. He made sure to give the Organoid a scratch under the jaw, right along the coils that tightened for biting, for his consideration in that regard.

He didn't usually sleep the whole night through so finding somebody else awake in the house was peculiar and disconcerting but Van with his legs stretched over the coffee table and a mug in hand was hardly frightening.

"Sleep okay?"

"Good." Raven glided by slipping into his boots. He was good at putting them on without stopping by now. Prozen used to be able to put his on going down the stairs but just the thought made the dog tags, emblazoned with _G. Prozen_, burn round Raven's neck.

"Where ya off to?" Van asked lazily but there was some tightness forming.

"Need a walk," he retorted honesty being the best policy here, "I'm getting jumpy."

"Right," at least the Republican seemed to comprehend that, "I'll save you breakfast."

"Thanks."

* * *

><p>Being casual with Van, skirting over importance, was surprisingly easy and deceptively comfortable but it didn't erase everything else the pair of them well knew was going on unsaid. Van was paranoid he'd run off, Raven was paranoid Van would start a conversation he couldn't participate in and both of them were apparently unsure about where this should or would go.<p>

Raven couldn't deny the village was well worn, loved, and rather beautiful if glanced at from exactly the right angle while all the same he couldn't really deny that Van wasn't too bad on the eyes either these days. That had never been an issue though had it? He'd kissed Van in unmentionable places when the Republican had baby fat and limited access to a shower. No there were bigger issues here and, annoyingly, the ones Raven had used as an excuse to cut their time together short last time no longer applied. There was no war to run off to, he didn't have any titles to win, he had no guardian to fight for, Van wasn't a nobody, they had plenty of shared history, plenty in common and the whole fucking world knew Van's last name by now.

He really didn't want to talk about the things he'd neglected mentioning when they were fourteen. He didn't really think he could. Their relationship since had altered things, morphed Raven's perceptions of Van, and had certainly crystallised details he'd only half suspected then. Truth was the closer Van's original, apparently ridiculous idea, got to solid reality the more Raven thought about it. Running off with some farm boy definitely didn't seem so bad now and the older he got the more he lingered on the suggestion.

He was up the hill under the lemon tree before he realized he was weaving through tombstones. When he planted himself by Dan's grave he was somehow unsurprised he'd been able to find it. He'd wanted to visit this spot for three years, even when he hated Van, Raven had wanted to run his fingers over the lettering in Dan's tombstone and apologise. That was an awkward proposition to summarise: _Hey Dan you were a real nice guy, sorry about your death, I tried to avenge you but the guy who killed you was a really good Dad to me for yonks so I sort of forgot all about it. By the way I started a life-long rivalry with your son but don't worry it's all cool now!_

Yeah, great work on that one, Raven rued shoulders slumping and his mind wandered stubbornly back over to a familiar patch of territory. When he'd abandoned that dank little cave and left Van to his own devices, expecting never to see the boy again, he'd… some part of him was relieved and the rest was rather mournful. Those moments with Van that had been good had been incredibly good. He'd been peaceful for a smidgen and the Republican was so hard not to like Raven had walked out of there more to convince himself of his own stupidity than Van of his. He'd gotten teary in the Zabre, he'd thought about going back, he'd spent the night tossing and turning and ruing every little thought and though he'd told Van the truth about how impossible it was and meant it going had hurt.

It had hurt in a very weak way then. Actually Raven had been over it, forgetful of it, by the time he reached New Helics. Tossing it away, letting it go, had proved to be easier than he'd expected and all the pain had vanished, along with the guilty feeling in his gut, as quickly as it had arrived. He'd felt nothing for Van, he'd felt disgusting for rocking his body up against the other's, he'd had no interest in him at all. That little wound festered though and every day since then it got bigger and bigger and bigger. Every time shit got worse for Raven he'd thought about Van's wrecked face and his naïve suggestion that Raven join the crew. Every goddamn time things turned sour he'd remembered that, every time Van amazed him, every time he discovered someone he loved was either insane or nasty or just plain not there anymore. Now it felt like he was carrying around a rotting limb where he'd lost most of the feeling. When Van nudged it Raven almost screamed.

"Pardon me," Raven lurched and cursed himself, he should've heard the man approaching from well away but he'd missed it. "Are you lost?"

When he caught a good glimpse at Father Leon he was back on his feet and almost around to face him. The old man nearly had a heart attack.

* * *

><p>Raven didn't like churches. Aside from the fact he was fairly sure he was going to burn in hell (or at the very least the gods had done some serious finger waggling and face palming at him since he turned thirteen) he hadn't had much to do with them. Why he'd consented to plant himself in one of the front pews beside the old priest gazing doggedly at the altar was a mystery for the ages. Call it pity.<p>

"I can't believe it's you." The old man was so chuffed with himself Raven hadn't had to say a thing since being shuffled in here. "When I couldn't find you I thought you'd died in the desert from dehydration. You were such a little thing."

Raven remembered Father Leon but not as well as he did Dan. The doctor who'd spent those few weeks border hoping with the Republican scouting unit tending to Raven's decimated head trying to asses if he had permanent brain damage. He'd spent a lot of time stuck with him but Raven had been a little too traumatised to pay much attention. That first bout of amnesia hadn't wiped Ambient or the murder from his mind after all. All in all Raven wasn't quite sure what to say to him.

"What on Zi happened to you?"

Oh here they went…

"The Imperial division found me," Raven tried to be remain vague hopefully Leon was enough of an isolated hick not to remember faces well but he gasped so loudly Raven wasn't sure if it was just sympathy or horrible realization, "one of the commanders adopted me."

"You poor boy, sounds like you've been dragged over the planet, it must've been quite a transition. Did they take good care of you?"

"Raised me like their own flesh and blood," matter of fact that was Raven's big problem, Prozen had said a lot of terrible things when the Death Surer had squatted like a parasite inside his mind and ripped it up.

In the end Raven wasn't sure how often or how conscious Prozen was of his actions or reality. What was him and what was monster was infinitely blurred at the end but likewise he hadn't settled wether Prozen was a monster when they meet or not. In the middle of that Prozen had been a much better father than the birth father he remembered. Prozen had made him eat his greens, tucked him in, answered to 'Dad', made him feel loved... He wasn't always dreadful but he was a good liar, Raven knew that, how much Raven had been lied to was the grey area now looming over his memories.

"Well at least we can be comforted by that much," Leon sighed and Raven let him have his comfort untroubled while he rubbed his palms into his own knees, "what are you doing here after such a long time?"

"Seeing Van."

"You know him?"

"Met in the military."

"Does he know?" Leon pressed avidly.

"Shouldn't I be asking you that?" He blinked.

"You see," the old man heaved, "after their father died I couldn't bear to tell them about you too. It just seemed unnecessarily cruel while they were grieving. Van's mother passed when he was very small, I can't say he remembers her, but when he was young he always wanted younger siblings. I think it was because he missed her but he didn't quite remember her. Poor boy used to cry. I doubt if he even remembers that now but when his father died too I couldn't imagine telling him he'd almost had a little brother."

"Well don't tell him now." That probably sounded harsh. "If anyone mentions it I want it to be my choice."

"Yes I should think that's your right if I haven't mentioned it myself all these years. Still I'm sure Van and Maria would love to know. They're very good people. They'd treat you like family."

"I bet they would." He scoffed. "Van treats everyone like family."

"He's always been part of a big community. We all closed in to help raise those kids so they never much fathomed the idea that family had to be blood related."

"He turned out great," Raven shrugged, "can't have hurt."

"What about you?" The old man was getting quite merry in his reminiscence by now with all these happy endings he was seeing. "Was the Empire good to you?"

"Can't complain with what I got. I had an extended family, a nice childhood, everything I needed and I'm good at what I do." He could afford to be flippant about the whole '_then we made global domination the family business'_ detail. He didn't think it was appropriate for the audience.

"I'm so glad. I'm sure Dan's glad to know you two are friends where ever he is."

"I bet he is," especially after Raven tried to skewer his son with a charged particle canon.

"What did they call you?" Leon appeared to realize he hadn't asked. "When we found you you couldn't remember a thing and we couldn't find anything in the house that gave us much of a clue."

"My foster dad named me Rae." Not a total lie. Frankly he probably could've told Leon the truth but he was so good at lying at this point and too tired to deal with all the extra questions he let the white lie fall.

"It's good to see you again," was the old man crying?

"I better get back to Van."

"Don't be a stranger."

Gods above was there something in the water at the Wind Colony that just _bred_doe-eyed sods? Was he just a terrible human being?

* * *

><p>"You're kidding me." Raven sighed in exasperation. Van actually thought it was pretty cute. "You're fucking kidding me."<p>

"Nope." He teased shaking the plate in demonstration under the Imperial's nose.

"That is a goddamn apple pie."

"Not just any Apple Pie at that: a homemade, farm grown, three generation recipe, Republican Apple-_fucking_-Pie."

"Oh sweet lord," Raven heaved, "if this gets any more clichéd I am going to cry. Where did you even get that? I was gone for an hour!"

"My sister loves me."

"So she just makes pie? You people have nothing better to do but bake?"

"And bred and weed." Van shrugged. "You know what they say about farming and prostitution."

"I'm going to pretend you didn't say that." Raven pressed the bridge of his nose between his index finger and thumb as he collected himself. Van was really living up to the stereotype here.

"Want some though?" He offered. "It's just like-"

"If you say '_just like Ma used to make_' I just might die from confirmed racial profiling." Raven warned. "I feel like I'm in a fifties sitcom. Like Pleasantville."

Van cackled. He was having way too much fun tormenting Raven with this but there was something charming about the exasperated expression that crossed his face when he tried to restrain his racial slurs and his laughter at the same time.

"I love pie." Van explained jovially as an aside. "I could eat it every day it's like my favourite food group."

"Pie is not!-" Raven buried his face in his hands, groaning, while Van let out another peal of laughter. Eventually though Van did get a chuckle from him in return. "You stupid mother fucker you are just making it worse for country folk everywhere. How do you not live in a trailer?"

"Couldn't afford it," He smirked and earned himself another cackle for the effort, "it's a shame you missed my Sister you know. It would've been great. She thought Fiona was questionable company! Faints every time she sees Zeke! You and Shadow would make her wet her pants!"

"You're a terrible person," they both chose to ignore the irony in that one for the sake of more senseless giggling, "what would you have told her?"

"I don't know," Van shrugged, "if you were wearing your combat suit I could've told her you're a full time bondage slave I'm eloping with to open a sex dungeon, would've been hilarious, I still might sell her that one."

"You keep that up and I'll tell her I'm a vegan pacifist from Mount Iselina with a pet shop." Raven grinned.

Van cackled.

"I'm telling everyone that!" He declared. "Every goddamn person!"

"I should play along just for the hell of it." Raven grinned tipping back the glass of juice to drain the last dregs. Everything here was fresh or dehydrated space food. It was delicious.

"See," Van tossed his boots one over the other and leant back far in his chair like a cowboy, "this is why you need to laugh and smile more often. You're absolutely terrifying when you're in a bad mood and irresistible when you're in a good one."

"Offering to be my wing man and get me laid huh?" He scoffed but let it roll on playfully. The pie fiasco Van had forced upon him since returning from the church had lulled him into a false sense of security.

"Tried it with Thomas and failed pathetically." The Republican sighed. "Thomas is a nice guy but he's so shy and I am way too loud to be anyone's wingman by the end of the night I had numbers from a crazy Porto stripper called Cinnamon and a quickie in the tool shed with two cadets."

"Sweet lord!" Raven moaned into his palm. "I don't know if I should call you a liar or just sad."

"I'm a friendly guy," Van defended before he could fight the upturn of his lips, "a _really_ friendly guy."

"So was that how you lost your virginity?" He was ridiculously curious.

"Oh no," Van waved his hand distantly, "it was way before that. At the academy after Rudolf's coronation I…I was pretty popular, none of the guy's around, lots of hormones…just sort of happened once, then twice, it was real casual and apparently I was good at it so I had plenty of takers."

"With the other guys at the academy?" Raven reeled lightly. Van knew he was lucky to have gotten this far into forbidden territory without Raven pulling them out of it but the Imperial seemed to have difficulty picturing that.

"Yeah, first one was this really great joker called Ferris," he retorted honestly.

"Didn't date?"

"No it was too awkward with Ferris," he teetered cringing a little, "I messed up the morning after and it soured the whole thing."

"How?"

"I…" Van shrugged. "When I woke up I thought it was you for a second but you were_ dead_at that point. So ruined the mood and I just felt weird."

"Why me?" Raven attempted to fathom.

"Cause last time I slept naked with anyone was that time I broke my arm," Van tested gently, "ya remember?"

"No," Raven spat weakly, "I don't remember that one time I made out with my arch nemesis."

"Was more than once," he joked lightly and Raven almost grinned, "sorry, anyway, what about you if we're on the subject?"

"I…" the Imperial sighed. "I lied. I did it with Reese once."

"What was that like?"

"We were having a bad night, one of those _I-hate-everything_moments, so we made some mixers and eventually decided that if we had sex with each other we couldn't ruin our first time." Raven muttered. "She's family. If it was between us we figured it would always at least be special somehow and we wouldn't regret it ten years later like we would if we had another bad night and knocked up a stripper or got knocked up by a stripper in her case."

"Was it any good?"

"Was messy," he cringed, "felt like crap in the morning but we laughed a lot. Neither of us were very good. No idea what we were doing. She told me off, I told her off, we made a neighbourhood watch joke and then there was something about drapes and carpets and what you call a Zoidian lesbian."

Van chortled.

"Could've been worse the," he consoled, "least it was special in a really retarded way."

"That's usually how we do things." Raven conceded. "I was dreadful."

"Apparently I'm _amazing_."

"Good for you." He was dripping with sarcasm at Van's grin by now rolling his eyes.

"How about dinner out tonight?"

"Out where?" Raven blinked. "There's nothing here."

"Out in the fields."

"Oh," he snorted, "you meant _literally_."

"Yep." Van beamed because, hey, that wasn't a '_no'._

"What till then?"

"You ever seen Republican day time TV?"

"Educate me." Raven ordered keenly.

Raven was going to get a lot of new material out of this Van guessed but an excuse to have some fun with the other young man, to make him laugh a little more, was definitely worth it. He didn't resent Raven after all this time for ditching him. He sort of got it. The Imperial had issues but he'd gotten better, or he was trying, and Van liked him too much still to be bitter. If Raven wasn't going to hold murder attempts against him Van wasn't going to use Raven's as gospel either. He was a little tired of the big hero thing actually. He was more than content to just wipe the slate clean and move on. God, Van just wanted them to move on…

* * *

><p>"All you people talk about is corn." Raven snapped eventually. "Corn and who the baby's father is. Corn, fucking, corn, fucking, rinse, lather and repeat! It's no wonder you're broke."<p>

"All the Imperial news covers is stocks." Van cringed sticking his tongue out in a gag motion.

"Cause we had money."

"_Had?_"

"No so much anymore," Raven reported with a private kind of smirk, "Prozen was skimming from the treasury since the day Zeppelin died. Rudolf's lost a billion dollars in taxes."

"Holy shit! Where'd he put it all?"

"Probably into buying all the stuff he used for Hiltz' army and the Ultimate Death Surer. Setting up city size laboratories and a Head Quarters, in secret, in the Valley of the Rare Hertz isn't cheap."

"You really have no idea where it is?" Van prodded cheekily.

"If I did I'd give it back." Raven swore. "I seriously have no idea but I'd bet it's under a mattress somewhere or buried in a back yard. Prozen didn't trust banks. Apparently accountants and lawyers were the only people on Zi he considered more diabolical than himself at any given moment."

"Oh man," Van fell back further in the couch clutching his head, "I should have known."

They'd managed to make it through most of the day without incident but Van knew eventually he'd have to gather up his balls and push his luck. He was painfully aware of time because in a situation like this you only really had so much before opportunity either passed into nothingness or eventuated. So he let his laugh fall off and strayed his eyes out the window. It was getting dark already. Across the field Maria would be making her hubby dinner, rocking a niece on her hip, probably helping her sister-in-law with some kind of menial chore. Good for her. Even Moonbay and Irvine would be settling down eventually and Van admitted he was feeling the itch.

He worked his heel into the rug and tried not to stare at Raven any longer than necessary. This definitely wasn't the clearest way to a nuclear family but Van wanted it. Things had been complicated enough in his love life just with Raven's memory let alone when the Imperial turned coat to the good guys and erased all of Van's immediate guilt for his unreciprocated feelings. It was probably just residual puppy-love from his first real crush lingering on into adulthood. Raven had plenty of pluses but if this idea of wanting to be with him was just part of a silly urge to fulfil an old fantasy Van would feel like shit if he lead the Imperial on.

Nothing was ever easy eh? Oh well, down in the nitty gritty of it? Van still had a thing for him, big time, and it had gotten worse with age rather than better. Hell, if he still wanted Raven after he'd killed the Shield Liger was he ever really going to stop running after this band wagon? Probably not, so why not shot for gold? He'd always been good at running head first into dumb ideas and coming out trumps.

"Want to go eat?"

"Eat the pie you mean?" Raven glanced away from the screen fleetingly, fingers worrying the dog tags round his neck distantly and Van didn't pay much attention to them. Van had his own set somewhere, in a box by the bed with his GF badge, pendant and some of Rudolf's medals.

"Yep," he winked, "curl up somewhere and eat under the stars, back to basics, and all that camping stuff."

"Sounds disgustingly romantic," yeah he was definitely onto Van but he'd kind of expected that, Raven wasn't an idiot. He'd only let himself be pushed as much as he wanted and then he'd throw down the brakes and Van would hear all about it.

"It's good pie." Van shrugged. He figured playing it casual couldn't hurt.

"You want to talk about it."

"Pie's a great topic." He grinned choosing to ignore the accusation there.

"Don't be stupid," Raven snapped, "you know what I mean."

"Yeah I do," he sighed, "come on, you know I won't give up till you let me crash and burn."

"Just don't come crying to me when things go tits up."

"Why not? You're so cute and cuddly."

"Ha. _Ha_. Go get the damn pie."

* * *

><p>It was a good time slot for a picnic but Shadow and Zeke were having trouble finding comfortable positions to glare at each other from in the grass. The heat wasn't unbearable but it was definitely still warm enough for Van to kick off his boots. The whole horizon was still water colours but the setting sun had gone back to hide behind the ruins outside the village. Van dug through the apples with a tarnished spoon and Raven propped the dish in his lap to scrape out the last of the gooey pastry from the bottom exposing the milk maid blue-china design that was definitely older than both of them.<p>

"Okay," Raven sounded suddenly with this prim finality that made the skin on the back of Van's neck prickle, "let's stop bullshitting and get to it."

He almost cringed but he when he sighed to put his spoon down he spotted the tiniest quaking in Raven's stubborn fingers.

"You're not good at this whole going with the flow angle are you?" Van laughed.

"Impatient."

"I can tell," he inhaled thickly through his nose to compose himself, "look-"

"No!" Raven's hands came up. "Wait. I get to go first."

"Why do you get to go first?"

"Cause I say so." He snorted in exasperation as Van held up his fist in challenge to settle this with a traditional game of rock-paper-scissors. "No. Grow up. My turn."

"Fine," he heaved uncurling his fingers, "you go then."

"I knew your dad."

_Oka-ay_… Van didn't expect that one and Raven looked a little surprised he was saying it himself. He fumbled for a second, Van was pretty sure he tilted his head so far to the right he must've looked like an owl, before the Imperial attempted to elaborate with a deep breath.

"My parents worked on Organoids. One ripped them apart-"

"That's why you hate Zoids?"

"No, hated them before that," Raven dismissed his mouth working very fast to get this all out without having to stop for long enough to lose his nerve. "I lost my memory. The Republic found me. Dan Flyheight's unit were scouting ruins along the border. They took me with them. Your father said he'd adopt me. Then they found Shadow, Prozen showed up and you know the rest."

"So you ended up with Prozen?" This was all coming together very slowly in Van's head. Raven had been talking way too fast but settled for nodding curtly now. "Dad was going to adopt you? How come Leon ne-"

"Didn't think it'd help the whole grieving thing," Raven snorted, "and yeah."

"So you don't remember anythi-"

"Not at damn thing. Prozen forged my birth certificate and luckily he did a pretty good job."

"Did…" Van almost felt himself turn pink. "When we…did you know…?"

"No idea." Raven swore firmly. "I forgot Dan too till after the Geno Breaker evolved."

"How-"

"Reese, how else?"

"Oh."

"Yeah."

"My turn?" Van supposed.

"_That's it?_" Raven's voice rose an octave and in the mild hysteria. Van suspected he either didn't seem to get it or Raven was a little insulted.

"Nope but I'm going to need a good ten years to digest _that_ little nugget. I expect you to be here for all of them cause;_ wow._But moving right along!" Van choked. "Look I think about when we..." he struggled over the word, "a lot. If I'm going to put all my cards down I still want you, more than ever really, and you can't give me an obvious no anymore I don't think. I want to try. I compared everyone to you. I'm sick of trying to find a substitute for no good reason cause I think I love you."

Raven buried his face in his hands and groaned pitifully but at the very least Van didn't feel humiliated. He wasn't being laughed at. He knew Raven well enough to know the Imperial took this seriously.

"I…" Raven considered it carefully when his head came back up and the words dragged thinly. "I worry."

"What's the worst that could happen?"

"First degree murder?"

"Aside from that," Van grinned trying very hard to maintain his straight face while Raven's shoulders remained taunt. "Don't want me?"

"That's not the problem." He admitted and Van's gut did a greedy little fist pump. "I'm not the nicest person. This could be a really big mistake. I'm not going to be easy to get rid of peacefully if I…I don't know, fall in love with you anymore because being halfway there already is dangerous."

"You think I'm letting you go anywhere before I figure out the stuff with my Dad? Cause _that's_ stupid."

"Really Van." He snapped. "I can't deal with making another person I love hate me."

"If I don't hate you now I never will."

"Point."

"I've seen all the bad parts," Van spread his hands out generously, "there's just all the good you haven't shown me yet."

"Oh the bad is many and varied. I've still got more."

"So do I." He insisted. "I'm not a saint- no don't look at me like that! Seriously! We balance out pretty well. I love you and at the very least I think you're pretty content here. I think you feel safe. Fair guess? You can just be you and I'll just be me, we'll be honest, stuff will be good and shit will be bad but the world won't end."

"I chewed you up last time."

"I can take it." Van declared finally and when Raven struggled for something else to say he decided to put all this nonsense to a stop. "No. Give it a rest. You haven't got a good reason. So I'm taking you home and I'm kissing you and I'm not going to stop till I feel like it or you break some of my bones. Whichever comes first."

"No one is ever going to believe this…"

"Come on," Van dismissed stubbornly over Raven's breathless snort, "I'm taking you home if I've got to throw you over my shoulder again."

"I've created a monster," Raven sighed but to Van's silent amazement stood and hung his shoulders, "why do I have this inane feeling that you'll track me down if I take off?"

"I will." He swore, pie dish in one hand, grabbing Raven's with the other.

"You sound like you're twelve."

"Better get used to it." He tugged firmly, abandoning his boots (screw whatever snake had the balls to bite Van Flyheight right now), squeezing Raven's bare hand between his fingers.

* * *

><p>Van hadn't been lying about the morning after with Ferris. He woken, sickly sweaty, arms secure around a smaller body and nose digging into the thick hair been quite convinced for a moment he had Raven back in his arms. He'd been so embarrassed he'd snuck out of there without his underwear for a walk of shame certain members of the dormitory had never let him live down. When he woke in the Wind Colony two years later, arms tight around the <em>actual<em> Raven, he checked himself groggily for a moment and then buried his face against the warm neck.

Raven twisted against Van's arms to roll onto his opposing side, pulling himself closer, a moment later and giving up Van sprawled onto his back to make the whole thing easier. Raven rose then, giving up any ruse of being asleep to tug the blankets higher, slumped back down hook his leg over Van's hip, pressed tight to him, and hid his face in the nook where Van's neck, shoulder and jaw held summit.

"You okay?" Van murmured in hushed tones. He was very aware of the two Organoids sleeping exiled in the lounge unaware of their consciousness. "I didn't mean to go all Commander on you last night."

"I needed it." Raven whispered. He sounded close, real, to Van and his thumb worked up and down the opposing side of Van's jaw as he made himself very small in the firmer arms. "I'm glad you did."

Van's muscles eased back to butter. Raven was warm, present, gooey and he couldn't find a single good reason to be worried about anything. He had that sense people get when they know everyone in a room is on the same page. If Van had any real comprehension of how pleased with the world Raven was at that moment he would've proclaimed himself '_King Awesome Forever'_ for achieving the impossible.

"Love you," it was very quiet and when Raven kissed his earlobe like that it was hard to hear but Van got it and he tucked it away somewhere safe as he squeezed the imperial tighter.

"Love you too."

* * *

><p><em>EPILOGUE<em>

Yakov and Borris were really lovers of the summer season. The amount of pansy ass family traffic that came through the back road near their hideout meant that they lived off relatively easy money for a few months. Most of the soccer mums who came out their way were lost and had just as much trouble finding the highway again as they did telling the police where exactly they'd been robbed. All they had to do was wave a few rifles around the place like drunken deer hunters and pocket any cash.

The sagging pale blue van they encountered on Sunday was of such pathetic posture they didn't have great expectations for their haul but the whole process of circling a motor vehicle and shouting '_get out of the car!_' waving your gun around made it a little hard to back down. Yes highway robbery was one of those professions you had to see through to the end once you started. So Borris stood in front of the car waving the rifle and Yakov stood by the door waiting for the driver to roll down their window.

"Get the fuck out or we'll-" the window lowered, one of those old plastic roll downs, and the driver rested his arm on the carriage patiently. "-blow you a…"

"No, please, go on." Van urged with a flick of his fingers and a warm grin. "I was really digging the passion there. Weren't you honey?"

Over his shoulder the passenger grunted, head buried in a well-worn novel, without giving Yavok any show of concern or Van any interest in the proceedings.

"So," Van grinned, "you'll do what?"

"I… um…" Yakov might've been a despicable little nobody but he read the papers, he listened to the radio, he stole cable from the elderly couple higher up the mountain and he hadn't been living under a rock these past ten years. "Nothing. Nothing at all."

"Darn," he sighed casually, "that's an anti-climax. So you guy's lost?"

"Just heading home." He decided wisely as the cargo on the top of the sagging blue van _moved_. "Borris get ya fat ass off the road!"

"What for?" The ruffian hollered back bemusedly.

"Just do it!" He screeched tossing his big, bulldog, head back to Van politely. "Sorry to hold ya up."

"Don't worry about it," he smiled, waving them off. "You boys have a nice day now!"

"You're terrible." Raven muttered quietly as Van rolled up the window and revved the despondent engine. "Little bitches are going to piss themselves."

"Couldn't resist." He snickered. "Pass me the radio?"

Raven fumbled in the glove box deftly, bookmarking the pages of his book with the fingers of his opposing hand as he did so, fumbling the little contraption and slouching back as Van's fingers secured round the receiver.

"Hey Thomas," he announced, "we've got a pair of noble prize winners in section 16."

"At least this will be a productive vacation I suppose." Raven murmured leafing through his pages again.

"Last good deed for the month, I swear," Van promised raising his pinkie finger from the steering wheel running his nearest hand over the other's knee consolingly. "I'll just do bad things to you from now on."

"I'll hold you to that."

"Rather hold you to-"

"That's your last pun." Raven warned tartly thrusting the corner of his book at him. "Last one. Savour it."

Van chuckled.

* * *

><p>AN: And so we're all done here folks. Thanks to those of you who alerted or fav'd whether you reviewed or not. I just like knowing you're out there reading this so you got my love. Much thanks though to whoever did actually review though (massively thanks).<p>

Anyway, three things:

1. I've got a _new_ Van/Raven fic that will be updating weekly from now on till my next dreadful bout of exams.

2. This finishes my request for Jamies but it was definitely good for nerves so if anyone out there has a request for a Zoids V/R fic please feel free to throw it at me. (I'm looking at you Rein Hitomi cause I know you've got to have some kind of idea up in that head~)

3. Multi-chapter or not is just fine, PWP is just fine, I'm a sucker so I'll try anything and write you most nasty things you dirty sods can picture. Shot me a couple of ideas if you want! Anything will be fascinating and I'll just be happy to hear from you. PM me if you don't want to leave it in the reviews.

Ps. Ferris came from watching too much Ferris Buller. Somehow I think he and Van would gel just wonderfully.


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